The inaugural PokerStars Championship Macau, which saw a record-breaking participation ended yesterday in the dream city Macau with some interesting highlights yesterday. Among the biggest winners at the inaugural festival, it was Elliot Smith from Canada who took down his first PSC HK$42,400 Main Event for HK$2,877,500 after negotiating a heads-up deal with Tianyuan Tang, while the former investment banker and current teacher Sosia Jiang emerged the newest PSC HK$103,000High Roller champ, winning a massive HK$3.87 million. In high Roller Event, India’s decorated player from New Delhi Raghav Bansal finished runner-up to collect HK$2.61 million.
PSC HK$42,400 Main Event
The final table of the PSC HK$42,400 Main Event began with Elliot Smith as the chip lead with 4,585,000 in chips. Trailing him on the final table was Terry Tang with 4,500,000 chips. The other notable players included Aymon Hata(1,970,000), Daniel Laidlaw (1,855,000), Avraham Oziel (1,735,000) and Pete Chen (1,170,000).
The first elimination occurred just on the 6th hand of the day when a short-stacked Yen Chen moved all-in with 10d-10c to run into Tang’s pocket Jacks. The flop brought Chen a third 10 but the river Jd fell on the board and Chen got busted in 6th for HK$705,000 ($90.7k US). The next elimination came in the form of Aymon Hata. The action opened with Smith who raised to 125,000 with Kc-Ks and Hata moved all-in with Qd-Jd. The flop Qs-Jc-3c put Hata ahead but the turn 3d changed the game, giving Smith a better two pair. Hata finished 5th place for HK$ 950,000.
The next player to fall was Australia’s Avraham Oziel whose pocket aces defeated Tang’s pocket sevens. He was 3rd casualty of the day and collected HK$1,280,000 for his efforts. After Oziel going out in the 3rd place, the heads-up game happened between Smith and Tang. The heads-up game took 173 hands and over 12 hours to determine the eventual winner-Smith. The final action of the last hand in the game saw Tang move all-in with 6c-6h and Smith holding Ad-Ks make the call to catch the bluff from Tang. The board delivered 6s-9s-7h-2s-3s, which made Canada’s Smith the newest PSC Main Event champ. He collected HK$2,877,500, while China’s Tang finished 2nd, collecting HK$2,577,500 his efforts.
Final Table Payouts (HKD):
1 Elliot Smith HK$2,877,500
2 Tianyuan Tang HK$2,577,500
3 Daniel Laidlaw HK$1,724,000
4 Avraham Oziel HK$1,280,000
5 Aymon Hata HK$950,000
6 Yen ‘Pete’ Chen HK$705,000
PSC HK$103,000High Roller
In the PSC High Roller that attracted a total of 180 entries for a whopping HK$17,460,000 in the prize pool, it was New Zealand’s Sosia Jiang who won it for HK$ 3,870,000 after defeating India’s Raghav Bansal in the heads-up game. It was Raghav Bansal from New Delhi who held the lead at the beginning of the final table. Four hours later, he found himself in the heads up against Jiang from New Zealand, who eventually took down the title.
The final day saw 8 players resume action with Bansal as the chip lead. Xixiang Luo was the first to exit, when his pocket nines were beaten by Quenneville’s Ace-Jack. The next player to fall was Lebedev whose pocket queens cracked by Jiang’s pocket aces. Lebedev exited at 7th place.
Jiang continued to fire and went on to rail Smith in 6th place and Ben Lai in 5th place. She was almost unstoppable and very soon she eliminated Petrangelo, when his Ace-Five suited lost to Jiang’s pocket aces. Up next in the 3 handed-play, it was Canadian Quenneville who went out in 3rd place for HK$ 1,800,000, leaving Jiang and Bansal in the heads-up game.
The heads-up game started with Jiang as the chip lead and she well-maintained her chip lead over Bansal. The final hand saw Bansal holding pocket deuces move all-in and Jiang holding Queen-Ten make the call. On the board, the river delivered a queen and Jiang became the newest champion of the HK$103K High Roller! Bansal finished 2nd, collecting HK$2,610,000, which amounts up to 2.16 Crores.
Final Table Payouts (HKD)
- Sosia Jiang – HK$3,870,000
- Raghav Bansal – HK$2,610,000
- Troy Quenneville – HK$1,800,000
- Nick Petrangelo – HK$1,465,000
- Ben Lai – HK$1,170,000
- Dan Smith – HK$895,000
- Sergey Lebedev – HK$652,000
- Xixiang Luo – HK$470,000