Home / Poker News November 2009 / PokerStars APPT Cebu – Day 4 report
PokerStars APPT Cebu – Day 4 report
Posted by: James Carter. - Mon, 2009-11-16 12:58
The final day of the
PokerStars Asia Pacific Poker Tour’s Cebu stop featured a curious way to get participants into the mood for confrontation. The boxing match between Manny Pacquiao and Miguel Cotto for the world welterweight title was projected onto a large screen right in the
tournament room, where fans cheered the two fighters on before the cards were dealt.
The heads-up poker bout that followed the boxing one from the screen was between Dong-Bin Han and David Hilton. Han had pretty much bullied the entire final table right up to the heads-up stage on Day 4 and he wasn’t about to stop for Hilton. His relentless aggression paid off, and eventually gave him the APPT Cebu title, together with the $148,200 first prize.
Despite the aggressively excited atmosphere that the boxing match infused into the final table field, eliminations came at on orderly pace. Aleksandr Tikholiz was the first one to hit the rail. He was soon followed by Phillip Willcocks, the last remaining “name” pro in the event.
Willcocks’ elimination was followed at a reasonable interval by Nick Pronk’s. The last of the Filipinos, Mark Pagsuyuin brought a populous camp of supporters to the final table, who didn’t miss a single opportunity to cheer him on noisily. Having come down to the last of his chips, Pagsuyuin shoved all in holding A,9o against Dong-Bin Han’s A,10. With no help from the board, the last local was forced to head to the payout booth tail between legs in 6th place.
Terry Fan, the chip leader of Day 1A who had swung his large stack masterfully since, was the next one to bite the dust. Kevin Clark and Sim Somyung were eliminated next to set up the heads-up stage.
The two players went into the duel level on chips, but the balance didn’t last long. Dong-Bin Han took control from the very first hand and kept the pressure right up to the very last hand of the event. Despite suffering a bad beat early on, Han was never in danger of being eliminated. He reversed the chip counts and soon had Hilton all-in on a Q, J vs Q,Q confrontation. His pocket Qs held up and the deed was done.
