Poker 6 2007 Report

To view the full seating plan and winners on each table please click here.

72 players sat down on twelve short handed tables of six for the second running of the Bolton Poker 6, a unique event with a mixed format that starts as a single table shootout competition on Day 1 and concludes as a regular multi-table tournament on Day 2. For the second year running Blue Square have added significant value to the £1,000 buy in No Limit Texas Hold’em event. £4,000 was added to winner Lee Atherton’s £17,640 first prize and the five players he defeated on his Day 1 starting table received a £1,000 consolation prize. Indeed, everyone who lost on Day 1 received consolation in the form of a free entry into the Grosvenor Plate tournament on Sunday, which had a total of £12,000 added to it’s prize pool.

Play on Day 1 was split into two flights, with six tables starting at 3pm on Saturday afternoon and a further six tables commencing at 9pm. Each player started with 6,000 chips and the blind levels increased every 40-minutes.

Day 1 - Flight A

Table 1 – Winner Jim Reid

This was the quickest table of the day with the experienced pair of Jonny Hewston and Lucy Rokach suffering early departures. Jim was heads up against Andrew Gill and they fairly evenly matched for much of the encounter before Jim managed to pull away and secure his place in day 2...

Table 2 – Winner Kevin O’Connell

Kevin dominated the table after taking an early chip lead, which steadily increased. The table also included 2006 European Number 1 Ash Hussain from Acrington, but it was Maged El Masry who Kevin faced heads up. However, by this stage Kevin had a commanding chip lead and the result never looked in doubt.

Table 3 – Winner Ramazanali Abbassi

An interesting table contrasting the loose aggressiveness of Paul ‘FATTERMARRA’ Moss and Dan Owston with the more conservative types Paul Parker and Alan Dean. Although short stacked from an early stage of the table, Paul Moss managed to battle back to face Rmazanali Abbassi heads up, but it was the Iranian who triumphed at the end of the day.

Table 4 – Winner John Sims

John Sims emerged as the winner of one of the quickest tables to finish.

Table 5 – Winner Mark Emery

The longest running table of the afternoon session. They still had five players left by the time Jim Reid had won on table 1 and were still playing well after Flight B had commenced. Circuit regular Paul Gourlay was the pre-match favourite to win this table, but he was beaten by Mark Emery, a Walsall regular and Blue Square qualifier, playing in the biggest game event since he started playing 18-months ago.

Table 6 – Winner Balvinder Nijjar

Another interesting table that included the talented Mr Ben Vinson - a young player from London, Malcolm Musket and Midlander Balvinder Nijjar, who now resides in Glasgow. After a tough contest, Balvinder beat Italian Dominica Micillo into second place.

Day 1 - Flight B

Table 1 – Winner Chris Cancelliere

Chris saw off Edinburgh’s Derek ‘Degsy1’ Malone heads up after a tense table that went to the wire.

Table 2 – Winner Matt Tyler

Arguably the toughest table of the tournament, including four well respected pros – Matt Tyler, GUKPT finalist Chris Bruce, Paul ‘Fishfrier’ King and recent Midlands Mayhem winner Allan McClean. This was the first table to be completed in the evening session with Paul King finishing third while Allan Mclean lost out to Matt Tyler heads up.

Table 3 – Winner Carroll Cotterill

Carol Cotterill, a £5 rebuy player from Walsall and Blue Square online qualifier found herself heads up against Blue Square sponsored pro Kevin O’Leary on a table that also included Neil Fox and Alan Armitage. The heads up stage lasted for a long time, but Carol eventually edged out the more experienced player.

Table 4 – Winner Lee Atherton

By the time table 3 had reached the heads up stage, this one had still to lose a player. But with the blinds increasing as the game progressed, the players began to drop like flies. Prolific online tournament player Dewi James finished in fourth but it was Lee ‘Alfiesdad’ Atherton who ended up as the big hitter, sending the rest to the boundary within a couple of overs. By the time it was completed, table 3 was still playing.

Table 5 – Winner Danielle Allen

Another very strong table that included Blue Square’s very own Mickey ‘The Legend’ Wernick, Liam ‘The Gentleman’ Flood and Blackpool’s Mick Fletcher. Danielle Allen had won her seat in the event via a freeroll but played confidently to get to a heads up situation against the fearsome Mick Fletcher. At one point Danielle was down to 5,000 chips but she managed to recover and comeback to snatch victory from Fletcher, who won the main event here in Bolton at last year’s Extravaganza festival.

Table 6 – Winner Dave Smith

Last year’s Poker 6 winner Steve Read was on this table, along with Steve ‘Womble’ Walsmley, Chris Gavriel and GUKPT Leg 5 winner Dave Smith. Finishing at close to 4am, the form man finally dispatched the Womble just as the last three hands of the evening had been called. By this time Smith had over 90% of the chips in play.

Day 2 - The Last Twelve

Each player started the day with 36,000 chips and the blinds set off at 100/200 with 40-minute levels. It was therefore no surprise that they were all still standing at the first break, two hours into play. Jim Reid had a roller coaster of a ride during this first session, losing many to Carol Cotterill before doubling back up courtesy of Chris Cancelliere, when his AT of diamonds made a flush against Chris’s pocket kings. Chris was the first to be eliminated, but Jim was not far behind, falling in 10th place. Not much before this, Kevin O’Connelll had been taken out in 11th. Kevin had played strongly and aggressively, but was on the receiving end of some pretty big pots. After becoming short staked he managed to double up a few times in quick succession before finally falling to Lee Atherton, who made a brave call with pocket eights against Kevin’s overcards on a flushing board. John Sims and Balvinder Nijjar were taken out in 9th and 8th respectively after which the players were sent on their dinner break and the table was redrawn for the final.

Day 2 – Final Table

Although the rest of this tournament is six handed, the final started with seven players so as to avoid a lengthy hand for hand scenario, which would have had an unfair imbalance if played on two tables. Matt Tyler was the unfortunate 7th finishing player, missing out on any further prize money beyond the £2,000 he had already locked up by winning on day 1. Having gotten short stacked, he made a move with J-7, but Lee sitting to his left, had found queens and made an easy call.

Sixth place went to Dave Smith, a man who needs little introduction, having won Leg 5 of the GUKPT in Brighton last month, where he won over £100,000. He had to content himself with just under £6,000 for this final table appearance.

Third place went to Danielle Allen, one of two female players to make the final. She had led for long spells during Day 2 but was not quite able to push on and take the victory. Nevertheless, having qualified for the event via a freeroll tournament, she was delighted to walk away with almost £10,000 for her efforts. She eliminated Dave Smith and also Caroll Cotterill in fifth. Carol also usually frequents the £5 and £10 games in Walsall, but had qualified online for this on Blue Square for a total investment on $11. Iranian Ramazanali Abbassi, another Walsall regula,r finished in fourth place.

Capping off a strong Midland contingent on the final table was online qualifier Mark Emery, who is usually a £10 rebuy player at Walsall. He was left heads up with Lee ‘Alfiesdad’ Atherton. Both had played with quite some spirit to reach this stage of the tournament and with such strong wills to win, it was no surprise that the heads up encounter turned out to be an epic encounter. Both showed great sportsmanship and there were several all-ins, near misses and river cards, but for which the match would have been wrapped up much quicker, but after a very worthy display it was Alfiesdad Lee Atherton who fittingly took home the best Fathers’ Day prize of all, after over two hours of heads up play. In the final hand Lee, holding pocket aces made a full house with Aces over fives against mark’s 5 high straight. There had been at least half a dozen all-ins previous to this and the chip lead had flip flopped between the pair for much of the last two hours.

Lee thoroughly deserves his victory and praised the event afterwards saying it was one of the few events he was prepared to buy in directly to, as he usually only plays big buy in events if he qualifies. He played some emotional poker, made some brave lay downs and waited patiently for good opportunities to get his chips in the middle. It paid off for Lee, who picked up £17,840 in prize money plus an additional £4,000 added by Blue Square. Mark Emery also deserves a special mention for his display on the final. Short stacked with four players left, he went for it and had taken the lead by the time Abbassi had gone in fourth. He would also have been a worthy winner, had things turned out differently.

Off The Table

Amongst the onlookers at the final table were several players who had been beaten by the finalists on day 1. They were all hoping their ‘horses’ would be the first passed the post so they could collect their £1,000 ‘saver’ prize, kindly donated by Blue Square Poker. Much banter ensued, including several of the railbirds swapping percentages with each other to increase their chances of sharing in the spoils. Jamie Struthers, Mark Rayner and Grant Cook were amongst the most enthusiastic of supporters, albeit for self-serving reasons.

On Saturday night there was also much camaraderie and if reports of the ‘nightclub crawl’ participated in by several players is to be believed, they had a cracking night out in Bolton as well as playing some top class poker.

The Grosvenor Plate

Blue Square added £12,000 to this £100 No Limit Texas Hold’em (one rebuy or add on) event, in the form of free entries to all of the Poker 6 Day 1 losing players. The £12,000 figure was based on the event selling out, but even though there were only 60 players who lost on Day 1, £12,000 stayed in the prize pool. Only 45 of these players returned to claim their seats (Fathers day beckoned for quite a few) and were joined by 33 players who bought in directly, making a field of 78 players, who had 62 rebuys/add ons. The total prize pool was a staggering £21,500 with a first prize of over £8,000.

It was a lively and good-natured tournament and this continued into the final table, which included Paul King, Liam Flood, Kevin O’Leary, Paul Parker, Olabode ‘Buddy Love’ Ayegun and Dominica Micillo. Dan Owston and Ash Hussain just missed out finishing in 11th and 10th places respectively. Liam Flood was the first to depart and after Paul Parker and Buddy finished in the 4th and 3rd spots, Kevin and Paul were left fighting it out for the silver plate trophy and the best consolation tournament prize money in the UK. The heads up was another lengthy encounter but Paul eventually won, consigning Blue Square pro Kevin to the bridesmaid position for the second day in a row, but taking a nice payday of over £4,000 for it, not to mention a much coveted Blue Square special edition watch (making a rare reappearance since it’s days as a 2006 Grosvenor Festival winners prize).

The full result:

Position	Player	Prize
1st	Lee Atherton	£17,840 plus £4,000 added by Blue Square
2nd	Mark Emery	£12,560
3rd	Danielle Allen	£9,200
4th	Ramazalini Abbassi	£7,760
5th	Carol Cotterill	£6,800
6th	Dave Smith	£5,840
7th	Matt Tyler	£2,000
8th	Balvinder Nijjar	£2,000
9th	John Sims	£2,000
10th	Jim Reid	£2,000
11th	Kevin O’Connell	£2,000
12th	Chris Cancelliere	£2,000

Jonathan Raab, 17th June 2007