Devan Tang: One in 100

With about QUARTER-HOUR left at the clock in Level 9, Lori Lagrosas, Operations Manager of PokerStars LIVE Macau, came visiting to her colleagues within the tournament area and offered them a high five. The selection of entries into the HKD$50,000 freezeout at this APPT festival had just ticked to 100--significant particularly for Lagrosas as she had boldly "guaranteed" that the tournament would attract that many players. She hit her guarantee with 1 / 4 of an hour to spare.

So it's that the overall warm-up before tomorrow's main event hits a record high, boding well for a bumper turnout for the week's flagship tournament. When the clock ticked to the top of the level, representing the tip of the late-registration period, there have been still a good 100 involved. That created a prize pool of greater than HKD$4.4 million, with the entire prize breakdown to be determined soon.

The young New Zealander Thomas Ward continues to dominate proceedings at this early stage. When he moved tables shortly before the top of Level 9, he needed racks sufficient to hold a stack of about 210,000, that is greater than four times what he started with.

"How good is that this guy?" a table-mate said as Ward found his new seat assignment, half in relief and half in frustration that the table's chips were heading elsewhere. Ward now sits at the same table as Dong Guo, who's in China's top 20 money earners and can be trying to add to his career total this week.

Speaking of China's rich list, Devan Tang was one of the crucial late registrants to this tournament. Tang lies fourth at the all-time China money list, largely way to four huge scores. In January of this year, Tang picked up USD$1,405,500 for finishing third behind Fedor Holz and David Peters in a great high roller tournament in Manila. The five men who finished immediately behind him were Steve O'Dwyer, Phil Ivey, Daniel Colman, Paul Phua and Mike McDonald. He can play tough.

Winfred Yu showed up late to this tournament, but he has already been eliminated. So has Quan Zhou, who currently results in APOY leader board. Zhou is becoming a typical at the European Poker Tour too and most recently cashed within the €25,000 high roller on the EPT Grand Final.

But he couldn't get A♣K♥ to overcome Xin Liu's J♦J♥, especially after a J♣ flopped. "Runner runner!" Zhou encouraged the dealer, however the dealer couldn't oblige.

There's still a ways to head for the 57 players who remain at this stage. They'll play another two one-hour levels tonight before returning to play to a winner at 3pm tomorrow.

We'll return an hour previous to that for the commencement of the primary event, and likewise to atone for what's been occurring within the various side events. 

The APPT Macau main event starts Wednesday, May 25 at PokerStars LIVE on the City of Dreams. Full details can be found at the official APPT website or via the PokerStars Macau page.

Read More... [Source: PokerStarsBlog.com :: Asia Pacific Poker Tour]