Ivey Surges

After another gruelling day at the WSOP Main Event the field was whittled down from 185 to 64, the high blinds and pressure of the situation meaning players were dropping like flies. A number of notable players made their exit overnight including David Benyamine, Cole South, ElkY, Joe Hachem, JC Tran and last year’s champion Peter Eastgate who put up a spirited defence of his title.

While a number of marquee names hit the rail there’s still plenty of starpower remaining. They don’t get any bigger than this year’s double bracelet winner Phil Ivey who had a great day surging up to over 6m chips and third place on the leaderboard. Besides those foolish few with bracelet bets against Ivey the rest of the poker world must be hoping for him to make the November Nine as it would surely lead to unprecedented coverage in the mainstream media. The world’s best player winning the world’s biggest poker tournament would be one of the biggest stories in poker history. However, there’s a long way to go yet.

Besides Ivey, famous names such as Antonio Esfandiari, Joe Sebok, Tom Schneider and Prahlad Friedman all have decent chips and the experience to do well in the coming days.

UK fans still have plenty resting on the Main Event with two of the nation’s finest players hanging in there. Jeff Duvall, whom Neil Channing crowned one of the UK’s greatest players of all time in the current issue of PokerPlayer, has nearly 4m in chips, well above the average. Hit Squad member and new Full Tilt pro James Akenhead is also still there and holds 1.6m after a very swingy day at the table.