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In the PokerGuru feature ‘This Week in Poker’ we bring you the weekly roundup of the most significant online scores by Indian MTT players along with the top stories from both the live and online poker circuit.
Here are this week’s top stories
This past week had abundant mind-boggling action both live and online.
Two major international stops ran simultaneously all week long. In the eastern hemisphere, the WPT took Vietnam by storm, and we had a strong Indian contingent in attendance that performed exceptionally well. Several seasoned Indian players joined the action, but the star of the show was Rubin Labroo who finished runner-up in the VND 4 Billion GTD Kickoff for ₹26.68 Lakhs, headlining a total of seven Indians who managed to cross the money line. Labroo went on to make another deep run in the VND 15 Billion GTD Main Event where he placed 17th, earning ₹6.80 Lakhs to return with a cumulative ₹33.48 Lakhs in winnings. Labroo’s blistering performance makes him our “PokerGuru Star of the Week!”
While Labroo drew first blood at the series, headlining Team India`s run in the Main Event was PokerStars India Team pro Aditya Agarwal. Proving once again why he is considered one of the best poker players in the country, Agarwal fielded through a strong field of 373 runners, finishing fifth to add ₹26.52 Lakhs to his bankroll. It was New Zealand’s Hamish Crawshaw who eventually came out on top to win the Main Event title and VND 3,782,723,000.
Right as the WPT Vietnam was underway, another group of Indian players was busy at one of Europe’s biggest casinos – Kings Casino, Rozvadov where the German Pokerclub Championship was playing out. At least 10 scores were posted by the Indians, eight of them coming in the Main Event alone. Spearheading Team India`s scorecard at the stop was Ankit Kapoor who ran the deepest in the Main Event, finishing 20th for ₹2.31 Lakhs. The PokerBaazi GameChanger winner Prashanth Sekar also ran exceedingly well at the series as he took down the King’s Big Thursday for his first-ever international title and a personal-best live score of ₹2.06 Lakhs. The tournament grossed 1,728 entries and crowned a champion in Germany’s Justin Frolian who took home €86,131 in prize money.
In London, the first-ever British Poker Open (BPO) is on the verge of wrapping up. After Mikita Badziakouski took down the £50,000 NLH for £486,000, all eyes are now on the series-ending £100K NLH that has whittled down to the final table. American pro Sam Soverel currently leads the BPO Leaderboard.
Coming back to home soil, we have the India Poker Championship (IPC) that is back with a BANG after a near four-year-long hiatus. The series is underway at the Big Daddy Casino in Goa and is already pulling in record numbers, with the series-opener ₹10K Freezeout drawing a record-shattering 437 entries. The numbers are possibly the biggest turnout ever seen in an opening event at Goa forcing the tournament organizers to extend the inaugural event to an additional second day!! Kavish Kukreja leads the nine-handed final table in the ₹10K Freezeout with 1.06 Million, and the tournament will crown a winner later tonight. The buzz is that multi-millionaire Instagram King Dan Bilzerian will also be making a brief appearance at the series over the weekend.
Online action was in full swing too. The biggest winner to came out of the virtual felts this week was an anonymous player called ‘hoodlincs’ who shipped The Millionaire on Spartan Poker for ₹19.49 Lakhs after defeating Anant ‘Pro’ Purohit heads-up. There is much more to look forward to with the upcoming ₹7 Crores GTD PokerBaazi Premier League (September 20 – 29) and Poker Dangal’s ‘Dangal 100 Max Series’ (September 17 – 21). For Indian`s looking to get in on international action, there is the 888poker XL Eclipse (September 12 – 22) and the ongoing partypoker’s $30M guaranteed Knockout series (September 8 – 22).
In other vital announcements, PokerHigh will be hosting a special tournament for the law fraternity named the Justice Mudgal Tournament – as a tribute to retired High Court judge Justice Mukul Mudgal. Poker streamer and partypoker pro Kevin Martin announced his retirement from poker streaming last week even as the WSOP added four more events to its schedule for the 2019 WSOPE.
In another exciting announcement, PokerStars LIVE has announced the return of the Red Dragon series that will once again be held in JEJU from November 9 – 15.
The most prominent tournament this week was Spartan Poker’s The Millionaire ₹1 Crore GTD. The event registered a massive 1,362 entries across three starting flights, collecting a whopping ₹1.36 Crores in prize money. Winning such a tournament would result in instant stardom in the ordinary course of things, but the winner this time went unreported as an unknown online moniker ‘hoodlincs’ decimated the field, eventually defeating veteran pro Anant ‘Pro’ Purohit heads-up to win the ₹19.49 Lakhs up top. Purohit walked away with ₹18.51 Lakhs for his runner-up finish.
Other notable scores include:
‘CrownUpJr’ won ₹6.57 Lakhs for 1st place in the Spartan Poker ‘Destiny 11.0 – ₹25 Lakhs GTD’
Anil ‘spewtard’ Adiani won ₹6.06 Lakhs for 1st place in the Adda52 ‘Mega Suits ₹25 Lakhs GTD’
Vishal ‘Vishallb22’ Bajaj won ₹5.91 Lakhs for 1st place in the PokerBaazi ‘BSS SuperStack ₹25 Lakhs GTD’
‘GHOSTF@CE’ won ₹5.82 Lakhs for 1st place in the Spartan Poker ‘Sunday SuperStack ₹30 Lakh GTD’
‘Bhavitarora97’ won ₹5 Lakhs for 1st place in the Adda52 ‘Godfather X ₹20 Lakhs GTD’
Aditya ‘i8stacks’ Sushant won ₹4.80 Lakhs for 1st place in the 9stacks ‘The Joker ₹20 Lakhs GTD’
‘ddege001’ won ₹4.80 Lakhs for 1st place in the Spartan Poker ‘The Elite ₹20 Lakhs GTD’
‘vrakesh1507’ won ₹4.23 Lakhs for 1st place in the PokerBaazi ‘The Summit ₹15 Lakhs GTD’
Rajat ‘OshoSwami’ Sharma won ₹4.17 Lakhs for 1st place in the Adda52 ‘The Whale – 6 Max ₹15 Lakhs GTD’
‘GRINDER1104’ won ₹3.55 Lakhs for 1st place in the PokerStars India ‘Sunday Special – Progressive KO ₹15 Lakhs GTD’
Rony ‘bisadip176’ Chowdhury won ₹3.01 Lakhs for 1st place in the PokerBaazi ‘The Endeavour ₹15 Lakhs GTD’
Laksh Pal ‘LuckyBhai$’ Singh won ₹2.39 Lakhs for 1st place in the Spartan Poker ‘Mega Stack ₹15 Lakhs GTD’
Pranav ‘mithrandir16’ Anand won ₹2.43 Lakhs for 1st place in the PokerBaazi ‘The Vegas ₹10 Lakhs GTD’
‘Pokerroller’ won ₹2.35 Lakhs for 1st place in the PokerBaazi ‘The Bout ₹10 Lakhs GTD’
Kunal ‘cvc’ Sharma won ₹2.33 Lakhs for 1st place in the Spartan Poker ‘ReCharge ₹12 Lakhs GTD’
‘Jaqten’ won ₹2.32 Lakhs for 1st place in the Spartan Poker ‘Head-Hunter ₹10 Lakh GTD’
Anurag ‘13anurag’ Shrivastava won ₹2.20 Lakhs for 1st place in the PokerBaazi ‘FRI-YAY ₹10 Lakhs GTD’
‘saker’ won ₹2.10 Lakhs for 1st place in the Adda52 ‘Big Slick ₹15 Lakhs GTD’
Gaurav ‘3betPanda’ Sood won ₹2.08 Lakhs for 1st place in the PokerStars India ‘Highroller ₹10 Lakhs GTD’
Shravan ‘D.Trump04’ Chhabria won ₹1.94 Lakhs for 1st place in the Spartan Poker ‘TGIF ₹10 Lakhs GTD’
Deepak ‘spot_fixing’ Singh won ₹1.87 Lakhs for 1st place in the PokerStars India ‘Sunday Special (L) ₹10 Lakhs GTD’
‘RateDocter’ won ₹1.65 Lakhs for 1st place in the PokerStars India ‘Uppercut – Progressive KO ₹8 Lakhs GTD’
Maria ‘MariaKirloskar’ Kirloskar won ₹1.50 Lakhs for 1st place in the PokerBaazi ‘Thursday MonsterStack ₹5 Lakhs GTD’
‘Aarchit’ won ₹1.47 Lakhs for 1st place in the Adda52 ‘GO GOA’
Abhinav ‘griezmann’ Iyer won ₹1.39 Lakhs for 1st place in the PokerBaazi ‘The Monster 6-Max ₹5 Lakhs GTD’
‘TRIPPINonACID’ won ₹1.23 Lakhs for 1st place in the PokerBaazi ‘Grinders #33 Main Event ₹5 Lakhs GTD’
Anuj ‘brockLesnar95’ Yadav won ₹1.21 Lakhs for 1st place in the PokerStars India ‘Monday Hustle ₹6 Lakhs GTD’
Sameer ‘Falcon_Prince’ Paranjape won ₹1.19 Lakhs for 1st place in the Spartan Poker ‘Big Daddy ₹5 Lakhs GTD’
Bunty ‘3streakbluff’ Choudhary won ₹99,498 for 1st place in the PokerBaazi ‘Grinders #14 6-Max Wednesday SuperStack ₹3 Lakhs GTD’
Parikshit ‘Zapdos123’ Dhall won ₹99,026 for 1st place in the PokerStars India ‘Night on Stars ₹5 Lakhs GTD’
Rajneesh ‘msdhoni’ Thakur won ₹99,015 for 1st place in the PokerBaazi ‘Grinders Friday SuperStack ₹3 Lakhs GTD’
‘prawnpickle’ won ₹98,511 for 1st place in the PokerStars India ‘Sixth Sense ₹6 Lakhs GTD’
Ram ‘mowgumotu’ Kakkar won ₹97,566 for 1st place in the PokerBaazi ‘Tuesday MonsterStack ₹3 Lakhs GTD’
‘Youngwolf009’ won ₹80,000 for 1st place in the Khelo365 ‘Twister ₹2 Lakhs GTD Deepstack NLHE’
‘Rvjn91’ won ₹88,200 for 1st place in the Spartan Poker ‘Ultimate PLO ₹2.5 Lakhs GTD’
Arjanveer ‘holdbaby’ Singh Chadha won ₹77,250 for 1st place in the PokerBaazi ‘Monday MegaStack ₹3 Lakhs GTD’
Suresh ‘insanium’ Kolli won ₹72,540 for 1st place in the 9stacks ‘StackUp @ 8PM ₹2.50 Lakhs GTD’
Mihir ‘AUTOPILOT’ Ganatra won ₹65,000 for 1st place in the 9stacks ‘StackUp @ 8PM ₹2.50 Lakhs GTD’
Sagar ‘Dont3betme’ Choudhury won ₹65,000 for 1st place in the 9stacks ‘StackUp @ 8PM ₹2.50 Lakhs GTD’
‘Sabir’ won ₹65,000 for 1st place in the 9stacks ‘StackUp @ 8PM ₹2.50 Lakhs GTD’
‘samir108’ won ₹65,000 for 1st place in the 9stacks ‘StackUp @ 8PM ₹2.50 Lakhs GTD’
Deepak ‘deepakdcdc’ Choudhary won ₹52,226 for 1st place in the PokerStars India ‘The Classic ₹2 Lakhs GTD’
‘momstacos’ won ₹59,010 for 1st place in the Spartan Poker ‘₹3 Lakhs GTD DST’
Shekhar ‘shakyshark’ Singh won ₹56,300 for 1st place in the PokerBaazi ‘BSS PLO ₹2 Lakhs GTD’
Vishal ‘mdigurgaon’ Tulsyan won ₹53,981 for 1st place in the PokerStars India ‘Sunday PLO ₹2 Lakhs GTD’
‘The Annihilator’ won ₹50,413 for 1st place in the PokerStars India ‘Zoom 3-Max Progressive KO ₹2 Lakhs GTD’
‘daiwik’ won ₹43,200 for 1st place in the Khelo365 ‘Big Bang ₹1 Lakh GTD NLHE’
Paras ‘AAKKQQJJ’ Jain won ₹43,192 for 1st place in the Spartan Poker ‘Ultimate PLO ₹2.5 Lakhs GTD’
‘Redjohn’ won ₹43,000 for 1st place in the Khelo365 ‘Mega Splash ₹1 Lakh GTD NLHE’
Dhinesh ‘you3betl4bet’ Kumar won ₹42,295 for 1st place in the PokerStars India ‘6 – Max NLHE ₹2 Lakhs GTD’
‘rdx1111’ won ₹32,154 for 1st place in the PokerStars India ‘Sunday Warm-Up ₹1.5 Lakhs GTD’
‘Prokiller’ won ₹29,769 for 1st place in the Poker Dangal ‘₹1 Lakh GTD Sunday Bonanza’
‘chunky20’ won ₹16,000 for 1st place in the Khelo365 ‘Deep Stack ₹40K GTD NLHE’
Read the complete story here
Online poker site, Poker Dangal last week revealed a unique tournament series, catering to low-to-mid-stakes players. The series will run from September 17 – 21 offering ₹15 Lakhs in guarantees in 17 events. All events of the series are capped off at 100 unique entries and only the top 10 players will make it in the money.
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PokerHigh recently came out with a special ‘Justice Mudgal Championship’ exclusively for lawyers, law students, in-house counsels, and interns. The ₹2 Lakhs guaranteed tournament pays obeisance to the former Chief Justice of the Punjab and Haryana High Court – Justice Mukul Mudgal and will be hosted on September 15 at 5 pm.
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Online poker start-up Pocket52 recently made headlines for running the most extended continuous online poker cash table session in the country that lasted an incredible 71 hours. The record-breaking session took place on their Pot of Gold 5-card PLO ₹25/₹50 cash table that was to award the last active player of the table wins an additional bonus.
After 71 hours of continuous action, users ‘Jungleman’ and ‘cooldude’ opted to sit out of the table at the same time and chopped the PoG pot worth ₹22,569 each.
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Multi-millionaire playboy Dan Bilzerian recently announced that he would be coming to Mumbai following his association with the sports-tech venture, LivePools. According to sources, Bilzerian is likely to make an appearance at the India Poker Championship (IPC) as a special guest. Bilzerian is expected to play a private high stakes cash game and possibly even hand out trophies at the series.
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A favored tournament stop for Indian players, WPT Vietnam, played out its second edition of the year from September 3 to 11 at the Pro Poker Club. The largest-ever contingent of Indian players turned up for the action, and as always there were a lot of accolades won by our challengers.
The scores started pouring in with the VND 4 Billion GTD Kickoff itself as a total of seven Indian cashes were registered. The most prominent of them all was the runner-up finish of Rubin Labroo for ₹26.68 Lakhs. He managed another deep run in the VND 15 Billion GTD Main Event, finishing 17th for ₹6.80 Lakhs. In total, Labroo collected a cumulative ₹33.48 Lakhs at the stop, for which he is deservedly our “PokerGuru Star of the Week!”
Another Indian who went all guns blazing at the stop was PokerStars India Team Pro Aditya Agarwal. The poker veteran was among the 20 Indians who made it to Day 2 of the Main Event and advanced to Day 3 alongside two other Indian survivors. Agarwal was the only Indian who could secure a berth in the final table, where he finished fifth for VND 861,108,000 (₹26.52 Lakhs).
Event Player Finish Prize Money
VND 4 Billion GTD Kickoff Rubin Labroo 2nd VND 862,923,000 - ₹26.68 Lakhs
VND 15 Billion GTD Main Event Aditya Agarwal 5th VND 861,108,000 - ₹26.52 Lakhs
VND 4 Billion GTD Kickoff Jaideep Sajwan 4th VND 369,267,000 - ₹11.41 Lakhs
VND 15 Billion GTD Main Event Jaideep Sajwan 13th VND 267,739,000 - ₹8.30 Lakhs
VND 4 Billion GTD Kickoff Laksh Pal Singh 6th VND 235,288,000 - ₹7.27 Lakhs
VND 15 Billion GTD Main Event Rubin Labroo 17th VND 219,438,000 – ₹6.80 Lakhs
VND 15 Billion GTD Main Event Alok Birewar 18th VND 219,438,000 – ₹6.80 Lakhs
VND 4 Billion GTD Kickoff Akshay Nasa 8th VND 160,356,000 - ₹4.95 Lakhs
VND 15 Billion GTD Main Event Sumit Sapra 22nd VND 150,151,000 – ₹4.65 Lakhs
VND 6.3 Million NLH Bounty Ronak Vyas 3rd ₹4.63 Lakhs
VND 4 Billion GTD Kickoff Akash Chandrashekhar 10th VND 103,707,000 - ₹3.20 Lakhs
VND 4 Billion GTD Kickoff Ashish Munot 17th VND 71,336,000 - ₹2.20 Lakhs
VND 6.3 Million NLH Bounty Vaibhav Sharma 5th ₹1.31 Lakhs
VND 4 Billion GTD Kickoff Jayjit Ray 51st VND 26,616,000 - ₹82,302
It was New Zealand’s Hamish Crawshaw who eventually won the Main Event for VND 3,782,723,000.
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The German Pokerclub Championship (GPC) ran from September 2-9 at one of Europe’s largest casinos – King’s Casino in Rozvadov with a total of 10 events in the schedule. Headlining the stop was the GPC Main Event that began on September 5 and logged a total of 1,728 entries (1,394 unique entries and 334 re-entries), creating a slight overlay to meet its advertised €500,000 (₹3.95 Crores) guarantee. Germany’s Justin Frolian took the event down for his career-first live title and the €86,131 top prize.
A small group of Indian poker players was in attendance at the series, and at least 10 cashes were posted by Team India. Headlining the Indian performance was Ankit Kapoor (20th for €2,916 ₹2.31 Lakhs) who was also the top Indian performer among the eight Indians who finished ITM in the Main Event.
Another Indian who hogged the limelight was the PokerBaazi The Game Changer 1.0 winner Prashanth Sekar. Sekar bested a field of 91 entries in the King’s Big Thursday to win his first international live title for €2,611 (₹2.06 Lakhs).
Event Player Finish Prize Money
GPC Main Event Ankit Kapoor 20th €2,916 - ₹2.31 Lakhs
€115 NLHE Saturday Night Turbo Vinayak Bajaj 4th €2,634 - ₹2.08 Lakhs
King's Big Thursday Prashanth Sekar 1st €2,611 - ₹2.06 Lakhs
GPC Main Event Gaurav Rohtas Gupta 36th €1,532 - ₹1.21 Lakhs
GPC Main Event Nehal Kumar Agarwal 57th €1,079 - ₹85,539
GPC Main Event Tanveer Singh Kohli 78th €906 - ₹71,824
GPC Main Event Pranav Khandalkar 88th €906 - ₹71,824
GPC Main Event Manish Goenka 89th €906 - ₹71,824
GPC Main Event Vinay Rajpal 114th €817 - ₹64,769
GPC Main Event Vinayak Bajaj 124th €728 - ₹57,713
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The 2019 World Series of Poker Europe (WSOPE), slated to run between October 13 – November 2 at the King’s Casino in Rozvadov will now have four more events on offer including a €250,000 Super High Roller, a $2,500 Short Deck event and two 8-game events.
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The Shinhwa World Resort – Landing Casino in the South Korean island of Jeju will once again play host to the famous Red Dragon JEJU that is returning from November 9 – 15 with a packed schedule of 18 high-value events. The series will be headlined by the KRW 2.5 Million buy-in Main Event (November 10 to 13) which boasts of a KRW 1 Billion guarantee.
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This past week, renowned twitch streamer Kevin Martin announced his retirement from Twitch and also exited partypoker Team Online. Martin, however, clarified that he is not quitting poker altogether as he intends to continue playing recreationally.
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Chinese Court Seizes Boyaa Interactive’s Funds
Last week, Hong Kong-based Boyaa Interactive International Limited’s cash reserves worth US$88.6 Million were seized by a Chinese court. The money could be confiscated if it can be proved that the funds are in any way linked to the misconduct of the company co-founder Zhang Wei.
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Daily fantasy sports company DraftKings made its debut in the West Virginia market earlier this week with the launch of its iOS and Android app. The move is well-timed with the upcoming opening kickoffs of the NFL and college football seasons.
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The British Poker Open (BPO) a contemporary of Poker Central’s prestigious series U.S. Poker Open (USPO) made its debut at the Aspers Casino in London last week. The 10-event series kicked off on September 2 and is now on the home stretch with nine tournaments done and dusted.
While it is Mikita Badziakouski, who has become the series’ biggest payout earner after he took down the £50,000 NLH for £486,000, leading the series Leaderboard presently is Sam Soverel. The American pro has enjoyed a breakout series that saw him final-table two events before taking down two £25K NLH events. Soverel now commands 780 points and is a good 360 points ahead of his closest competitor Stephen Chidwick. The series-ending £100K NLH is down to its four-handed final table and is scheduled to play down to a champion on Thursday.
Event Player Prize Money
£50,000 NLH Mikita Badziakouski £486,000
£25,000 NLH Sam Soverel £322,000
£25,000 NLH Sam Soverel £280,000
£25,000 NLH Sergi Reixach £253,000
£25,000 PLO Stephen Chidwick £202,500
£10,000 NLH Paul Newey £156,400
£10,000 PLO George Wolff £120,000
£10,000 NLHE Luc Greenwood £119,600
£10,000 Short Deck Sam Greenwood £110,400
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The fourth stop of the World Series of Poker Circuit (WSOPC) at St. Charles Ameristar culminated with the $1,700 Main Event crowning a champion in Scott Hall. He overcame a field of 414 entries and former gold ring winner Andros Ioakimides heads-up to win the title for $130,667.
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The Season XVIII World Poker Tour (WPT) Legends of Poker $5,000 Main Event crowned a winner in 43-year-old Aaron Van Blarcum who won $474,390 (including a $15,000 seat into the WPT Tournament of Champions). The event attracted 520 entries to create a mammoth prize pool of almost $2.4 Million, and the top 65 places got paid.
Two-time WSOP bracelet winner Nipun Java finished 27th for $14,100 (₹10.10 Lakhs).
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Eric Bunch came out on top of a field of 1,242 entries at the recently concluded 2019 WinStar Labor Day River Poker Series $1,500 Main Event and took away $260,000 in prize money following a heads-up deal with Spencer Champlin.
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And with this, we conclude this week’s roundup of the latest news updates and developments from the world of poker. We will return again next week with our weekly report, stay tuned.