Thorel Shoves First Hand of Heads-Up

Christian Zetzsche

Level 28 : 50,000/100,000, 10,000 ante

In the very first hand of heads-up play, Jean-Noel Thorel faced a raise of Josip Simunic for 225,000 and moved all in. The Austrian was totally surprised by this: "I thought we were going to play a bit." Thorel only had a "Call if you want to play" and huge grin on the face.

Some time passed by then Simunic asked for a count, it would be 3,080,000 to call.

"Show if I fold?" the Austrian inquired. He then counted his own stack and sighed.

"I really don't know what to do to be honest," Simunic continued. He even considered flipping a coin and took a chip, but then realized that both sides of the chip would show the exact same.

"You don't want to see an ace?" Simunic asked, referring to an earlier hand where Thorel had also just moved all in and said exactly that.

After about nine minutes, the clock was called on the Austrian and he had one more minute to think about his decision. Thorel pulled his smart phone out and asked if he could take a picture of his opponent. Tournament director Thomas Lamatsch denied that, so the Frenchman handed over the phone to friends on the rail, who then took a picture.

"Show if I fold this time?" Simunic asked once again and then mucked his cards with three seconds to spare. Thorel grinned and his rail said "ne montre pas", so the Frenchman giggled and replied "my coach says no" before releasing the cards to the dealer.