Season Three is now well under way and we recently played our 3rd week which saw the League table begin to take significant shape for the first time.
Week 3 was a Double-Chance freezeout with 2 x 2500 chips and a 25-minute clock which often sees some "looser" (did I spell that correctly ?!") play when people have chips behind them still to follow.
Steve Redfern, Will Young and Maxine McKinlay were all missing tonight due in part to an early flight to Edinburgh the following morning, a slight error on the part of the fixtures-Secretary there and that left us with 16 runners including new boy Richard Davis.
Early casualties were Paul Melia, who never recovered from having his aces cracked, Steve Freer, who would later fall asleep while watching the Final Table and Marcel Furet, all of whom exited before the 1st break at the end of Level 2 when everyone then took their remaining chips available.
League Champion and current leader Tony Trippier was low-stacked after being all-in early on for his opening 2500 with
on a
ac
flop, only to get called by Joey Williams with
:as: ah
Out in 13th place went Richard Davis followed by Dave Allen meaning that everyone currently in the Top 5 League positions looked set to make the points once more.
Unfortunately for Ant Williams, that was not to be when he became the Bubble-Boy, meaning that he would be a spectator at a Final Table rather than a player for the first time ever.
Moving onto the FT and on a board of
jh
Mr Trippier made a bet with
kd qh
and got re-raised by Andy Overton with
js
and with 2 rags then hitting the board after the money went into the middle, Mr T exited in 10th place, meaning that we were certain to have a new League leader at the end of the night.
Since having those Aces early on, Joey Williams had been very quite and had lost much of what he gained on that hand but when waking up in the BB with
ac
after a SB shove from Darren Hooper with
ks tc
an :as: on the flop saw Dazza exit in 9th to score his first points of the season.
Chris Baker was looking at risk so when he picked up
qh qs
he shoved over the top of Paul Foy"s raise with
ac ks
The board came
:as: kd
but as Chris got ready to leave for the bar, the killer qc kept him in the game to leave Paul stunned.
When you get done like that by a 2-outer, you sometimes realise that it is not going to be your night and that was confirmed for Paul a few hands later. Up against Malcolm Howell, Paul"s
ac
was ahead of Malc"s
on a board of
ac :
:
but once again, a river of :
: gave Malc the higher straight and saw Paul out in 8th for 3 points.
Joey had continued to make brother Ant look loose with his ultra-tight play but got it all-in with
tc td
only to find Chris with kd ks
and Joey left in 7th place.
The in-form player at the table was Matt McKinlay, sitting in 3rd place at the start of play and getting some good online wins leading up to this game.
Up against Andy Overton, all the money went in on a flop of
Matt showed kc jc
Andy tabled
Matt went ahead on a qc turn but the
on the river made Andy"s full-house to leave Matt with 5 points that could see him go top of the table.
Andy now took the chip-lead but Tod Wood had designs on leaving for Edinburgh as League-Leader but when he shoved with
qd th
Brian Yates made a marginal call with
ks td
and Tod failed to hit his 3-outer and exited in 5th spot.
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Chip-leader Andy then held ah
and called a shove by Chris who had tried to steal with
but the flop of
:
:
saw Chris reap a pot of 35000 chips to put himself well in contention for the win.
Brian then exited in 4th place when a shove with ks th ran into Chris with
ah and Andy also laying down kh jh on that hand.
Soon afterwards though, Andy couldn"t lay down ac :as: and Chris was priced-in to make a crying call with his
jc
He had hope on the flop with
qs :
: , the turn brought the
but the js river killed Andy who just couldn"t find a way to beat Chris when well ahead all night.
That left Malcolm and Chris heads-up for the League lead. A win for Malc would make him the first player in BCPC history to win 2 League games while if Chris won he would take a 4-point lead into week 4 in August.
Well the game reached Level 12 (a record) and the final hand was dealt at 2:24AM (another record).
On a flop of
Chris bet, Malc re-raised all-in and Chris insta-called.
Chris had
th while Malc was drawing pretty thin now with
and the remaining cards of :
: :
:
gave CHRIS BAKER the victory and leadership of the BCPC Season Two at the halfway mark.
TABLEPOS PLD PTS
1 CHRIS BAKER 3 26
2 TOD WOOD 3 22
3 MATT McKINLAY 3 20
4 MALCOLM HOWELL 3 20
5 TONY TRIPPIER 3 19
6 BRIAN YATES 3 16
7 PAUL FOY 3 15
8 ANT WILLIAMS 3 14
9 ANDY OVERTON 2 10
10 JOEY WILLIAMS 3 10
11 MARCEL FURET 3 7
12 PAUL MELIA 3 6
13 MAXINE McKINLAY 2 5
14 DAVE ALLEN 2 4
15=STEVE FREER 3 2
15=DARREN HOOPER 2 2
17=RICHARD DAVIS 1 0
17=STEVE REDFERN 2 0
17=WILL YOUNG 2 0
Top 6 receive seats, top 10 receive option to enter APAT Team Championships in December representing the BCPC.