China’s Li Yu Leads the Poker King Cup Macau Final Table
The penultimate day of the Poker King Cup Main Event has come to a close and the official eight-handed final table is now set; the ninth-place departure of Korea's Jeho Lee making it an all-Chinese affair.
The pace of play on Day 3 was relentless throughout. The trend was elimination after elimination, big pot after big pot, and by the time the field was reduced to a final table of ten, it was Li Yu who topped the counts.
Yu’s hot streak began just before the last two tables were reached, waking up with pocket aces after the tournament’s last female player, Lin Zhe Chen, moved all-in with ace-king. The case ace hit the flop to lock up the hand for Yu, shooting him into pole position with a stack of 2.7 million – a million more chips than next closest rival at the time Jeho Lee - and sending Chen to the rail in 21st for an HKD 65,600 payday.
While the rest of the field had caught up by the time play reached ten-handed, Yu still held the lead, though it looked like he might come unstuck after having a big bluff picked off by Yang Wang, with the pot putting the latter in the lead.
However, some canny play and a little bit of cunning saw Yu, holding pocket aces again, set a trap for Qi Cheng Du, who walked right into it with pocket jacks to put Yu back atop the counts with over 4-million in chips.
Yu would end the day with 3,445,000 – over 100,000 more than next closest rival Wang. However, this is only just over one and a half big blinds so Yu still has some way to go to close out the tournament. Du too is in with a chance, albeit a slim one and he's coming in as the table short-stack with ten big blinds.
Poker King Cup Macau 2018 Main Event Official Final Table
| Table | Seat | Player Name | Country | Chip Count | Big Blinds |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | Yang Wang | China | 3,340,000 | 56 |
| 1 | 2 | Jun Fang | China | 2,170,000 | 36 |
| 1 | 3 | Wei Ran Pu | China | 2,415,000 | 40 |
| 1 | 4 | Cang Sheng Ni | China | 710,000 | 12 |
| 1 | 5 | Liang Song | China | 740,000 | 12 |
| 1 | 6 | Qi Cheng Du | China | 605,000 | 10 |
| 1 | 7 | Jian Dong Yu | China | 2,080,000 | 35 |
| 1 | 8 | Li Yu | China | 3,445,000 | 57 |
The day began with 62 remaining players out of a field of 518, all already in the money and guaranteed a payday of HKD 27,900, but none of them were aiming for that, with all gunning for the HKD 7,536,900 top prize.
The busts outs began immediately and did not stop until play concluded. Notables who ran deep, but came up short of the last two tables included Portugal’s Antonio Martins (51st for HKD 33,200), Hong Kong’s Sparrow Cheung (46th for HKD 33,200), China’s Sun Bin (36th for HKD 45,200) and Day 1c and 1b frontrunners Ke Fei Na (34th for HKD 45,200) and Zhang Chao (30th for HKD 45,200) to name but a few.
The man who began the day with the chip lead, Day 2 frontrunner Shi Qiang Lin, enjoyed a deep run but ultimately came up short after getting pocket kings cracked by the ace-king of Du to hit the rail in 14th place for an HKD 87,400 payday.
Hong Kong’s Chi Fu Sze (12th for HKD 107,800) and China’s Ke Wang (11th for HKD 107,800) both came agonizingly close to making the last ten, but fell at the last hurdle.
It was Taiwanese player, Chi Hi Fang, who became the first Final Table casualty, running queen-nine suited into the pocket tens of Wei Ran Pu to depart in 10th place for HKD 107,800.
However, it was Korea’s Jeho Lee who became the last casualty of the day. Lee had flirted with the chip lead himself for a large portion of the day but came to the Final Table as the second shortest stack.
Unfortunately for Lee, after the table shortstack Liang Song cracked Du’s pocket kings with ace-jack to double, it was Lee the man under pressure. The Korean eventually made his last stand with king-ten, but ran into the ace-jack suited of Wang to bring play to a close.
All remaining players are guaranteed a payday of at least HKD 195,200 when play resumes for the final day at 1pm local time, with blinds recommencing on level 28 and will be 30,000/60,000 with a 10,000 running ante. The PokerNews live reporting team will be on the tournament floor until a champion is crowned, so join us then.