Event #2: £5,250 Pot-Limit Omaha

As Paul Zimbler said, chugging along with around 15,000, "Omaha tournaments! Love it, could have 150k in the next ten minutes! I've come back with a tenth of the average and won before!"

This gives hope to all the small stacks who could in a matter of moments be big ones - and looking round in the last few minutes there have been several all-in life-on-the-line moves but no bustouts. The pick of the lot:

Tim Flanders shoves preflop over the top of a Willie Tann raise (Tann being another first event finalist success story, now with 80k!) for just 4,500 more. Tann says, "You don't want me to call," which sounds a bit like a question. Flanders says, "If you've got a pair, you should call," at which point Tann passes and Flanders shows him      ...

Aarno Kivelio gets it all in preflop for what looks like just over one big blind, but finds Robin Keston raising to 10,700 and picking up surprise button caller Yasuhiro Waki who bet him off the now large sidepot on a       flop. Kivelio managed to hold for his bowl of rice and is still kicking...

Barry Greenstein adds to his modest but apparently rock-solid chip towers by taking out the short stacked Jan Jachtmann with a relatively small preflop call of his shove with        . Jachtmann showed         which didn't make the winning broadways straight like Greenstein's hand did on the           board.

This table is eating through players at a fast rate, and stacks like Chris Bjorin's are feeling the benefit - he's now on 150,000+. Full chip counts at the break in 20 minutes.

"Phil! Phil!"

Willie Tann was calling over to fellow six-max finalist (indeed, bracelet winner) Phil Laak; his purpose was to alert Laak to his (Tann's) double up which was in progress.

Tann:     

Oskar Lind:     

Board:      

Tann's aces turned into a flush by the end, and he doubled to over 65,000. Lind meanwhile looked as though he might be sick and was left with mere shrapnel.

Lind pushed for his last 2,700 the very next hand with     . Alfonso Amendola looked him up from the big blind with an esoteric sort of      which in the event made a full house on the       board to eliminate the luckless Lind.

Penned by MarcC, but owing to the internet suddenly turning slow (we see you on your ipads, poker players!), posted on the one computer that seems to be running fine:

We missed Frank Kassela's exit but Leiven Ketels got his last 2,200 in from early position and was looked up by Willie Tann in the BB. Showdown:

Ketels:     

Tann:     

The board ran      

Tann made a better two-pair on the turn to scoop the pot.

We found Robin Keston betting out a pot-sized 19,200 on the turn of the      board. Felipe Ramos, who on 21,000 had only little more than that left to his name, tanked up for several minutes. Eventually he folded and snuck just the tiniest resentful look at Keston, who was up to 55,000 after that.

Ah Omaha, an unpredictable flop-reliant sort of game where to regard a hand like         as a comedic mismatch of the best and worst hold'em hands would be to misunderstand the way it works on a fairly fundamental level. Nevertheless it did look a bit funny in Robin Keston's hand as he took down a pot from Rory Matthews, having raised under the gun and picked up only Matthews as a caller. He also called Keston's 4,500 bet on the       flop, but there was no further betting from either party as the turn and river fell    . Keston showed his Aces which took the pot.

Two hands later and an out-of-position Yasuhiro Waki had the        , with which he just check-called Erik Friberg, the final chips being bet on the turn with the board        . After firing this 8,500, Friberg declined to follow it up on the   river and this was the very point at which the     had come into its own, if the Aces hadn't previously been in front.

A Dan Shak limp from UTG brought almost every other player in to see a     flop. The action checked to Alsfonso Amendola who bet pot (5,600) and was only called by Oskar Lind in the BB after some thought. The board paired with the   on the turn and that scared both players to checking at this juncture as well as the   river. The Italian tabled      but lost out to Lind's     .

Well, he just eliminated Hoyt Corkins, all in preflop with         vs. Kimber's         - the board coming           - which has led to a rather gap-filled table now being broken and distributed around the room. An even 45 players now remain - still quite a lot of fighting distance between now and the money at two tables.

Raul Paez is the most recent elimination, getting the rest of his 12k or so in on a flop of       with top two and a gutshot:        . Jeff Kimber gave him a spin with a flopped set of sevens:         which held over the     turn and river to drop another player and increase Kimber's stack to 42k.

So speaks Jack Effel, quite correctly, of the extremely punctual returning field of players. Everyone, short or monster-stacked, was ready for the first hand dealt, and there's been a rather expectant atmosphere as the first few players leave Day Two for good. Among them is Daniel Tafur, the shortest stack with 4200, whose bid for a comeback with four cards (       ) didn't get past Steve Jelinek.