Phil ‘OMGClayAiken’ Galfond confirms his place as one of the best Pot Limit Omaha players in the world after overcoming possibly the best final table in WSOP history.

Tuesday 17th June 2008

The table was packed with some of the best ever poker players. Phil Hellmuth, Johnny Chan, Daniel Negreanu, John Juanda and David Benyamine circled around each other, titans of the live poker scene for the last decade. In the end, it came down to two online players to tackle each other in one of the most gruelling heads-up battles at the Series so far.

The chip counts at the start of play were as follows:

Phil Galfond - 1,393,000

Brian Rast - 1,176,000

David Benyamine - 1,041,000

John Juanda - 694,000

Johnny Chan - 624,000

Kirill Gerasimov - 558,000

Daniel Negreanu - 460,000

Adam Hourani - 300,000

Phil Hellmuth - 119,000

Seeking out his historic twelfth WSOP title, Phil Hellmuth began with a much-needed double up courtesy of Benyamine. The Frenchman flopped two pair, but by the time the chips went in on the turn, Hellmuth had hit a better two pair, which held for a boost to the chip stack.

While the players all dreamt of the gold, one player whose dreams turned into something of a nightmare was Brian Rast. One of the most respected PLO cash game players on the net, Rast lost a massive pot against Johnny Chan. Both got the money in preflop, with virtually identical hands, A-A-5-4 against A-A-9-2 for Chan. Rast flopped the nut flush draw though, while Chan hit bottom pair. No spade came for Rast, and the second deuce on the river gave The Orient Express the 1.2 million chip pot.

If that wasn’t bad enough, Rast had been mercilessly needled for his play by Hellmuth, so must have felt relieved when he got the Poker Brat to commit his stack with K-K-5-4 against his A-A-2-2 double suited. Hellmuth caught one of his four outs on the turn though when a King arrived to send Rast reeling.

Rast eventually got his remaining chips in against Chan with top pair, a flush draw, a back door flush draw and a gutshot straight draw, while Johnny showed a lower pair, a better flush draw and not much else. Chan hit an ace on the river to make just a single pair, but enough to know Rast out of the tournament.

The elimination of the short stacks came next, with Hellmuth out in eighth and Negreanu in seventh. Chan continued to run good on this final table, eliminating Juanda in sixth. Juanda tabled top pair, an open ended straight draw and a flush draw against the top two pair of Chan, making Juanda a 55% favourite. Chan faded all of the outs as he had against Rast, allowing him to rake in another monster pot.

When someone runs that good in a tournament, you simply put it down to it ‘being their day’. The remaining players dug deep though, and derailed Chan just as it looked as if he was unstoppable. Firstly Benyamine doubled through him after his set outdrew the straight of Chan on the river, before Galfond crippled the last man to win back-to-back Main Events. Chan managed to outlast Kirill Gerasimov, who was eliminated in fifth, but the fourth place and opportunity to tie with Hellmuth’s eleven bracelets must have disappointed him.

With Benyamine and two of the biggest online cash game players left, perhaps this was the moment where many expected the more experienced player to thrive. It wasn’t the case though, as Hourani pressurised Benyamine into making some big folds, and then eventually finished the job off, flopping top set against the overpair.

The heads-up battle between Galfond and Hourani raged on for over 100 hands. Galfond had begun with a 2-1 chip lead on his adversary, and had whittled him down to just under half a million in chips. The final hand saw Galfond strike a piece of luck of his own, after his hand improved on the turn to overtake Hourani and give him the WSOP bracelet so many had expected him to win – just perhaps not at this final table.

Congratulations to Phil Galfond, winner of perhaps the toughest final table the World Series will ever see.

Source: OnlineCasinoNews