With one week left of Season Three there are just 7 players in with a chance of lifting the Title after a night in which just 3 of the previous top 10 made the Final Table.
Tony Trippier was almost first out but clung on and so that honour went to Clive Padden.....who then took the card round and promptly won it !!
Steve Freer went next before Tony finally departed and was quickly followed by League leader Nathan Harris who tasted the disappointment of not making a Final Table for the first time since joining the League in Week 2.
That took us down to 20 players on 2 tables and when Debjani Duncan pushed all-in with tc td Andy Overton followed suit with qh qs and that prompted Marc Ward to pass his ace.......which would have won on the ace-high board that followed.
Deb"s other half Andy Duncan quickly followed his wife when running ad tc into Matt Mc"Kinlay"s ah :as: and so that was 4 players from the top 10 down.
Out in 18th went Richard Davis but in very unfortunate fashion as his ah kc matched up well against Mick Wells with kd td but a board of :
:
jd killed Richard"s hopes.
The next elimination was a big one. Tod Wood shoved with his
and got called by Mark "Card-Rack" Eagles with the monster that is ah
(Though he was chipped-up and hitting everything, in his defence !). Marc Ward then also got involved with td kd and that prompted Ant "The Rock" Williams to pass his pocket Jacks.
The flop of kh
was great for Mark and the ac on the turn even more so before the
on the river sealed the double-elimination and left Ant congratulating himself on being able to pass a monster !
Soon afterwards, Ant picked up the biggest monster of them all in
ac and was delighted to see short-stack Mick wells shove all-in ahead of him with just :
:
. Marcel Furet, who had been steadily accumulating chips, also came along for the ride with his th
and was delighted to see a flop of
tc the turn came the :
: to keep Mick interested also, but the killer card was the
on the river, completing Marcel"s straight and eliminating Ant and Mick.
Matt and Maxine McKinlay were then eliminated in 13th and 12th respectively before Brian Yates made an ill-timed shove with th
and got called by Marcel with ah
and that turned into trip aces by the turn to take us to the Final Table.
At this stage only Malcolm Howell, Will Young and Paul Foy were left from the starting top 10 and so they had a great chance to steal a march on their rivals, but for Season Two Champion Andy Overton, the dream of repeating ended when he pushed ah js into Marcel"s
and got no help from the board and exited in 10th place.
Steve Bayliff returned to BCPC action after a two-game break and maintained his 100% Final Table appearance record but then got crippled when his kd qs ran into Harry Ward"s ac kh before Will Young finished him off.
"Shirt Of Shame" wearer Joey Williams ensured that he wont be wearing it next month with an 8th place finish before Rob Hewlitt exited in 7th and that meant that all 3 of the players in the Top 10 at this Final Table were still in.
Will Young looked to be done for when he made a move with :
:
only to get called by Marcel with ac tc only to see a :
: on the flop and a :
: on the turn to bail him out. But just 2 hands later Marcel shoved with
qh and an ace on the flop got him all of those chips back against Will with
.
Will quickly got them all-in once again with
and got a caller in Paul Foy with kh ah but a blank board saw Paul exit in 6th place and sees him going into the final week as the only player to make 4 Final Tables in Season Three and yet mathematically, he cannot now win the Title whereas people below him in the League can !
Malcolm Howell had become the first player in BCPC history to make ten Final Tables tonight but looked in trouble when his all-in shove with ad
got THREE callers, yet amazingly the Poker Gods were with him and he quadrupled up !
He then got all his gains in the middle with tc td against Marcel"s th js but this was Marcel"s night and he made a straight on the river to knock Malcolm out in 5th place.
That put him one point ahead of Nathan Harris at the top of the table but a 2nd place finish for Will Young would see him take over that spot. However, when Will shoved on a board of kh
:
: Mark Eagles made a big call with
and Will sheepishly turned over qh jd and left in 4th place.
That left Harry Ward to fight for the spoils with Mark Eagles and Marcel Furet and it was a two very strange hands that saw Harry"s 3rd place exits as he pushed with
and Mark Eagles"
:
: took him out !
Mark became the first player to take the "Shirt Of Shame" onto the Final Table in week 4 and tonight he showed that was no fluke. But Marcel recently cashed in the GUKPT at Walsall and he showed THAT was no fluke by being the first player to win three times at the BCPC when his ad qs saw off Mark"s qd js .
Victory catapulted Marcel up 9 places in the League to 4th and he, along with Tony Trippier, Andy Duncan, Marc Ward, Will Young and Nathan Harris will all be trying to win that coverted trophy and Title when Season Three ends on April 16th.
TABLE AFTER WEEK FIVE
POS PTS
1 MALCOLM HOWELL 31
2 NATHAN HARRIS 30
3 WILL YOUNG 27
4 MARCEL FURET 23
5 MARC WARD 23
6 ANDY DUNCAN 21
7 PAUL FOY 18
8 TONY TRIPPIER 16
............................................
9 HARRY WARD 16
10 MATT McKINLAY 15
11 MARK EAGLES 14
12 TOD WOOD 12
13= CLIVE PADDEN 10
13= MICK WELLS 10
15 ROB HEWLITT 9
16 STEVE FREER 9
17 BRIAN YATES 8
18 DEBJANI DUNCAN 7
19= RICHARD DAVIS 5
19= MAXINE McKINLAY 5
21 ANDY OVERTON 5
22 STEVE BAYLIFF 5
23 ANT WILLIAMS 4
24= STEVE REDFERN 3
24= JOEY WILLIAMS 3
26 BRETT SINCLAIR 0