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World Series of Poker

Soon it´s time for the final table in the 2009 WSOP that takes place at the Rio Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas between November 7-10. We want to give you a preview and let you know the nine players at the final table, also called the “November Nine”. Here they are:

Darvin Moon is the chip leader of the WSOP 2009 final table. He is 45 years old and he is from Oakland, Maryland. He has no experience of World Series of Poker and learned to play poker with his friends back home. He won a satellite to enter the tournament.

Phil Ivey is the most famous poker player at the table. He is a real poker professional and have seven WSOP bracelets but has never been at the final table at the Main Event. In 2003 he was close, but ended up in 10th place. He is 33 years old and is from USA.

Joseph Cada is only 21 years old and is the youngest player at this table. He is from Michigan and has already player 15 WSOP events and have winnings over $500,000. This young man can be dangerous at this tables aswell.

Kevin Schaffel is from Florida and is 51 years old. He have been playing poker since he was 11 and also loves to play golf. Favorite music is country and favorite movie is Pulp Fiction.

Eric Buchman is second in chips at this final table and he is from Valley Stream, New York and is 28 years old. This is his second final table in WSOP this year, he finished 6th in the Omaha/Seven Card Stud Hi-Low-8 or better Event.

Steven Begleiter is from Chappaqua, New York and is 47 years old. He is married and has 3 children and when he is not playing poker he is coaching his kids sports team. He played in the WSOP 2008 but didn´t make it this far in the tournament.

Jeff Shulman is 34 years old and lives in Las Vegas. He is the editor for the famous magazine Card Player magazine. He has been at the WSOP final table before, in 2000 and he finished at 7th place. Has over $1 million in poker winnings.

Antoine Saout id from France and made his way to the tournament by a satellite winning. He is 25 years old and lives in Saint Martin des Champs.

James Akenhead is from London, England and is 26 years old. He is a poker professional and finished 2nd in an 2008 WSOP event, and won $520,000.

This is the “November nine” that will be sitting at the WSOP final table November 7-10. Here comes the chip count in order:

1. Darvin Moon  58,930,000   
2. Eric Buchman  34,800,000  
3. Steven Begleiter  29,885,000  
4. Jeff Shulman  19,580,000  
5. Joseph Cada  13,215,000  
6. Kevin Schaffel  12,390,000  
7. Phil Ivey  9,765,000  
8. Antoine Saout  9,500,000  
9. James Akenhead  6,800,000

Mike Sexton has been elected to poker hall of fame. He is the 38th poker player that has been elected to poker hall of fame. There will be a cermonie held for this accation at November 7th. This year there were 9 finalists that was nominated for enter the Poker Hall of Fame, and now it was Mike Sextons turn. It was the best poker players in the world that was nominated, Phil Ivey, Erik Seidel, Scotty Nguyen, Barry Greenstein and Daniel Negreanu was some of them. Mike Sexton himself was deeply honored.
2009 is 30 year anniversary for Poker Hall of Fame and it was 15 Hall of Fame members and 15 media representatives that was deciding who was gonna win.
Mike Sextons biggers tourney win was the 2006 WSOP Tournament of Champs, with a great final table with players like Daniel Negreanu, Chris Ferguson and Mike Matusow. In this tournament Mike Sexton won $1 million in first prize. He also have won a WSOP bracelet in 1989, when he won the $1,500 buy-in Limit Seven Card Stud High-Low event, beating 174 poker players.
Mike Sexton also works as a World Poker Tour host and comment the play at TV. Some of the existing members in Poker Hall of Fame is: Doyle Brunson (1988), Phil Hellmuthselected in 2007, legendary Stu Ungar, Chip Reese, Barbara Enright and Johnny Chan who was selected in 2002.

The first PKR Heads Up Grand Slam is now over and the winner of this tournament was Vladimir Geshkenbein. He is not very famous for people around but he has won the APPT Macau High-Rollers event beating Johnny Chan once. But this time he was Vladimir Geshkenbein against Juha Helppi at the final table in this heads up tournament. Vladimir Geshkenbein came to the final table beating Sudworth in the semifinals. The last hand of the night was when Juha Helppi wnt all in with his A spades-6 clubs and was up against Vladimir Geshkenbein´s hand Q-10 of diamonds. Flop was K-9-K and its was an open straight for Geshkenbein. Turn card was 3 of diamonds. No help for either player. River card was a 2 of diamonds and with the flop card 9 it was a Queen high flush and it was all over. 1st prize in PKR Heads Up Grand Slam was $120,000 and this is the final scores in the tourney:

1 Vladimir Geshkenbein $120,000
2 Juha Helppi $70,000
3 Alex Torelli $45,000
4 James Sudworth $35,000
5 Tony G $20,000
6 Ian Frazier $20,000
7 Lex Veldhuis $20,000
8 David Steicke $20,000

Aaron Gustavson won EPT London a few days ago defeating the WSOP 2008 champion Peter Eastgate. The american 23 year old Gustavson played great all tournament. There was 730 poker players attending the EPT London and the first prize for Gustavson was £850,000. Aaron Gustavson was the chip leader when the final table begun, but everybody though that Peter Eastgate, who was not long after Gustavson in chips, would win the tournament. One after one they final table players went out of the tournament, until it was only Gustavson and Eastgate left. Then it was time for dinner break.
After the break it was time for heads up. And this would be the shortest heads up i European Poker Tour history. After the first hand this was almost over, when it was a really big pot that Eastgate had to fold when Gustavson raised at the river. Now Aaron Gustavson had a 6 to 1 lead in chips. Only six hands later it was time for the last hand in the tournament. Eastgate had A-9 and raised, and was re-raised by Gustavson and had to go all in. Gustavson had A-Q and no help for Peter Eastgate, and Aaron Gustavson took home his biggest win in his carrer.

This was the final table finish:

1  Aaron Gustavson £850,000
2  Peter Eastgate, Denmark £530,000
3  Nikolai Senninger £285,000
4  Martin Gudvangen £227,000
5  Dominic Cullen £173,000
6  Rui Milhomens £124,000
7  Raymond Wu  £87,000
8  Karim Bennani Smires £50,100

Next EPT event is EPT Warsaw in Poland. This takes place between 20th-25th October.

Big names came to London to participate in EPT London. And the EPT London high roller event was popular with 75 players attending and the buy in was £20,000. And it was not just any players, some of the best tournament players in the world were there. Full Tilt´s Phil Ivey was there, Tom Dwan, Dave “Devilfish” Ulliott, Chis Moneymaker, Berry GreensteinBertrand Grospellier and Greg Raymer was also attending this high roller event in London. But the final winner of the tournament was Matt Glantz, who is very know to be at Bobby´s Room at the Bellagio in Las Vegas.
 - Probably, out of the top 100 tournament players in the world, 50 to 60 were in this tournament, Glantz said according to pokerlistings.

Matt Glantz won the tournament beating Erik Cajelais and first prize money of £542,000. But Cajelais has no need to be sorry. Just about a week ago he won the 2008 WSOPE $2,500 Pot-Limit Hold’em/Pot-Limit Omaha event.
The final table was not easy with many great players like Eugene Katchalov who won the 2007 WPT Five Diamond championship, Dennis Phillips and Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies.
But the winner was Matt Glantz, who most often play cash games at Bobby´s Room in Las Vegas. But he has done well in tournaments before. He finished in 4th place in the 2008 WSOP $50k H.O.R.S.E Event. According to himself he plays more for the competition than for the money.

EPT London continues until October 7th and buy in to main event was £5000+£250.

Play at Only Poker today.

The poker pro Tom “durrrr” Dwan won $1,2 million in one hand. It was under a TV broadcasting for Full Tilt Poker´s tv program “Million dollar cash game” that he went in to a hand with Phil Ivey. Other pro poker players at the table was Mike Matusow and Patrik Antonius. But in this historic hand it was only Tom Dwan and Phil Ivey that was involved. This crazy pot started by Dwan bet $40,000 after flop Q-3-5. Phil Ivey called. Next card was a 4, and Dwan raised it to $250,000. Phil Ivey went all in and Tom Dwan fast very fast to call. At this point Ivey was worried. Phil Ivey had A-2 but Tom Dwan had 6-7 and had the better straight. This pot was a total of $1,2 million and was a really historic hand. The turn card was a nightmare for Ivey and a dream for Tom Dwan. This hand will go to the history as one of the most crazy pots ever.

It was the swede Fuat Can who won Unibet Open i Prague this year. This poker pro now leaves Prague with €167,500in first prize money, but first he will party with his friends who also stays in Prague, he told the swedish newspaper Aftonbladet. 451 players was attending Unibet Open and when it was time for final table two swedes were at the table. Andreas Andersson did well but had a lot of bad luck and was sent out at 6th place with winnings of about €30,000.
When it was time for heads up it was only Fuat Can and Marco Adams from Holland left. Adams was chip leader and after an hour he was an even bigger chip leader. But things turned and Fuat was never worried he said to the newspaper. The final hand of the night Fuat Can picked up 9-9 (his favorite hand) and Marco Adams had A-K off suit. After a Fuat raise Adams rerasied but at this time Fuat put all his chips in. Adams called quickly. No help for Marco Adams and the game was over, Fuat Can was the winner of Unibet Open 2009.
Fuat Can has been a pro poker player since 2002 and lives in Gothenburg, Sweden. He is 31 years old and this tournament winning was the best thing in his career. He is a great live player who likes both cash games and tournament, but prefers tournaments.

Tomorrow the WPT Borgata Poker Open takes place at Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa in Atlantic City. Between September 19 and September 24 it´s time for this great event that is filled with the best poker players in the world. Buy-in to main event is $3,300+$200 and in this event it´s $2 million guaranteed.
This event will be broadcast on TV and you get 30,000 in starting chip.
This is how the schedule looks like in the WPT championship event:

Day 1A     September 19
Day 1B     September 20
Day 2       September 21
Day 3       September 22
Day 4       September 23
Day 5       September 24 (Final table day)

We come back with the results after this event.

Isabelle Mercier has been a member of Team Pokerstars Pro for five years but has now decided to quit because she wants to take on new projects, she said. This means the French-Canadian poker pro has turned down one of the best sponsorships in the poker world. It´s not clear what project she will be joining now.
Isabelle Mercier is one of the best woman in the world at poker and that she shown at the World Poker Tour Ladies night II in 2004 when she won the event. Last year she was at the final table at Euro Poker Tour (EPT) in London and has won over $1 million in live tournaments.
Isabelle Mercier´s best finish in online poker was in PokerStars Sunday Million this year in june where she finished on third place and won $115,000. Representatives from PokerStars wishing her the best and said that it was Isabelles decision to not renew her contract with PokerStars, according to PokerListings.

Scotty Nguyen is one of the best poker players in the world today. He is a very active player and between 2000 and 2004 he was “In the money” in over 100 tournamnents. Scotty was born in Nha Trang, Vietnam in 1962. He has won five bracelets in World series of poker and his biggest win was in 1998 when he won the main event. In 2008 he won the $50,000 H.O.R.S.E World Championship.
Scotty is very well known to play with a lot of emotions and he is also famous for his expressions “yeah baby” and “That´s poker baby” when it comes to bad beats. At the 1998 World Series Of Poker he said, in the last hand of the tournament, to his opponent Kevin McBride: “You call, gonna be all over baby!” 9-9-8-8-8 was on the table and McBride called. Ofcourse Scotty Nguyen won with a better hand (9-9-9-8-8).
The day after this event, one of his brother was killed in a car accident in Vietnam and this is why Scotty Nguyen don´t wear his 1998 WSOP bracelet.
Scotty Nguyen have been broke a coulpe of times in his poker career but he has always manage to rebuild the bankroll. Scotty finally won a World Poker Tour event in 2006, beating Michael Mizrachi.
At 2009 his total winnings in tournaments is $10,700,000, and we can be sure this will be bigger over the next few years. Right now he is in a commercial for the gambling company Expekt.com.