The Live Final of the BCPC"s Premier League I took place on Friday July 1st.
The top 4 in the league after 10 online games qualified automatically and were awarded 200 chips per point gained and they were
Brian Yates (14,000)
Will Young (11,600)
Tod Wood (9,400)
Steve Redfern (9,000)
The other two finalists were determined by two Heads-Up games between the 5th and 8th placed players and the 6th vs 7th placed, both over the best of 3 games.
In the first match Andy Overton beat Man-Of-The-Moment Tony Trippier 2-0 and that meant that Andy took his 7,400 chips to his seat at the Final Table.
In the 2nd game there was somewhat of a shock when Paul Foy, having been bottom of the league with just 2 games to play, ousted favourite Steve Bayliff 2-1 to take his place as shortstack with 6,800 chips.
With 58,200 chips in play and blinds starting at 50/100, all 6 players were relatively deep with only Brian and Will being above the 9,700 average stack but that became irrelevant early on in level 2 when Tod Wood raised the button to 375 and Brian in the small blind called. Will in the big blind made it 1200 to go and Tod folded.
Brian 4-bet to 3300 and Will insta-shoved....and Brian insta-called and showed
ah which crushed Will"s js jh and when the board gave no help, Will was out in 6th place and Brian held a monster chip-lead.
By the first break Brian was down to 18,900 but it was Paul Foy who was making the moves with a hero call on the river against Steve Redfern moving him up into 2nd on 13,300.
Andy Overton was the shortstack and soon after the restart he left in 5th place when Tod"s kh ks crushed his
and he was quickly followed by Steve Redfern whose button-shove with :
:
got picked off by Brian with :as: tc and so the remaining 3 players were in the money.
By the time we reached the 500/1000 level all 3 players were relatively close but Paul moved into the driver"s seat when his :as:
was too good for Tod"s
kc when the
flopped but Tod then doubled-up to 13,000 when his qs js outdrew Brian"s :as:
before Paul finally ousted Tod in 3rd place, giving him $100 prizemoney.
Paul now held a 2-1 chip advantage and looked set for a sensational victory. Brian shoved twice early on uncontested but there then came the pivotal hand of the Heads-Up battle.
In an unraised pot the flop came
and both players checked. The
on the turn saw Paul check-call Brian"s bet before shoving on the
river and getting insta-called by Brian with
tc Paul holding the
for the 2nd nut-straight.
That gave Brian the lead for the first time and 3 hands later, when Brian limped pre-flop, Paul shoved with :as:
and Brian made the call with ac tc and although the board of kh
gave Paul hope, the river bricked and so Brian added the Premiership Title to the Premier League win and collected $300 while Paul was a terrific Runner-Up and banked $200.
