Dren Ukella moved all in for his remaining 511,000 and Jason Mercier made the call, committing about half his stack to the pot.
Ukella:
Mercier:
The flop was , Ukella's deuces still leading. He spiked a set when the landed on the turn, leaving Mercier drawing only to a chop, but the arrived on the river, making Ukella quads and doubling him up to 1,127,000. Mercier was left on the short stack with under half a million.
Fintan Gavin raised it up preflop from the button and Davidi Kitai made the call from the big blind. On the flop, Kitai checked, Gavin bet 150,000 and Kitai called. A on the turn led to a second check from Kitai, followed by a second barrel by Gavin to the tune of 200,000. Kitai folded. Gavin showed a red ten.
In what has become the recent trend, Daniele Mazzia opened for a raise all in. Action folded to Davidi Kitai and he made the call. Mazzia winced, knowing he was likely behind and sure enough he was. The players showed:
Kitai:
Mazzia:
The flop came leaving Kitai in the lead but giving Mazzia an open ended straight draw. The on the turn helped neither player but Mazzia supporters erupted when the river fell the . He made the straight to put Kitai's otherwise dominating hand in 2nd place. Mazzia, who was down to just 80,000 chips not long ago, is now sitting on a workable stack of 671,000.
Davidi Kitai was first to act and put less than 50,000 into the pot. It was obvious to all, including the EPT commentators, that he meant to raise, and simply confused the chip values. Nevertheless, it was ruled he could only call. Action folded around to big blind Fintan Gavin and he checked his option.
The flop came and both men checked. When the hit the turn, Gavin led out for 145,000 prompting a quick fold from Kitai. Needless to say, the outcome of the hand might have been much different had Kitai raised as he intended to. We'll be left to wonder what affect, if any, this has on his performance in the tournament.
Despite the slow, play-friendly structure of EPT events, the blinds and antes have more than caught up with the average stack size. Since the break, we have seen a short stack raise all in on virtually every hand. Unless otherwise reported, they just pick up the blinds and antes, but at 105,000 per hand, it won't take long for the short stacks to become big stacks and vice versa.
Down to just 95,000, Daniele Mazzia had to dodge two callers in Sebastian Ruthenberg and Jason Mercier. After the board was inevitably checked down, Mazzia's paired nine was enough to take the pot as his foes announced king high and ten high respectively.