Event #2: £5,250 Pot-Limit Omaha

Jeffrey Lisandro is a man who really needs no introduction, but in case you've been living under a rock where there is no poker coverage for the past few years, Mr. Lisandro will tonight be tossing his fifth WSOP bracelet in the pile. This is, though, his first European WSOP bracelet, and also his first in Omaha - his previous four were all in stud poker and were all picked up in Vegas, including three in one Series which earned him the title of 2009 WSOP Player of the Year.

Lisandro battled through a very small but unbelievably high-class field, and although he had to outdraw aces right at the end to take it down, that was no small achievement. Coming back with 15 players today instead of the scheduled nine looked as though it might make for a very late night, but in the event the high-variance nature of Omaha and the aggressiveness of the players made up for the extra numbers, and Lisandro will still get to enjoy some of London's nightlife before he returns to his hotel room to reflect on a job well done.

In a fast-paced final where almost every player took at least one turn at being chip leader, it could have gone anyone's way. Lisandro seems to have a magic touch at these things, though, and as he poses for his winner's photos (although he did refuse to do any interviews) he looks extremely comfortable and relaxed. As though he could get used to this sort of thing.

Many congratulations to Mr. Lisandro, and indeed to all 15 players who made it as far as Day 3. We'll be back tomorrow with the continuing £1,000 NLH event, but from our Omaha outing at the WSOPE, it's over and out.

Jeffrey Lisandro had picked up a few small pots, putting his stack at 680,000 when Joe Serock opened for 75,000 from the button. Lisandro made it 220,000 to go, and just a few short moments elapsed before Serock quietly announced, "Pot." A call all in from Lisandro, and they were on their backs.

"Aces?" said Lisandro.

Yup.

Serock:     

Lisandro:     

"Smells like a bracelet to me!" called over Shannon Shorr from the rail. But he spoke too soon.

Board:      

There was a brief silence from the crowd; if Lisandro has any supporters here at all, they are keeping a very low profile. Then came a few sad cries of, "Hang in there, Joe!"

Whatever the rail's feelings about it, the current stack sizes are Lisandro 1,360,000, Serock 440,000.

Just a few minutes ago Jeffrey Lisandro was the short stack here - he asked TD Jack Effel to colour up the T1000 chips, but then was most unwilling to part with the two leftover ones, requesting that they be left in his stack rather than removed from play as the schedule required. So perhaps frustrated by his inability to double up in that last hand, Lisandro really turned up the aggression after that, and he has actually now taken a slight chip lead over Joe Serock.

It was several smallish hands that did it rather than one huge encounter; Lisandro's favourite trick right now seems to be calling Serock's button raises and then check-raising on the flop - he did it on a     flop, and then again a few minutes later on one that read    . Both times Serock folded, and the stacks now look like so:

Lisandro - 940,000

Serock - 860,000

First heads-up blood (we imagine a nosebleed where chips come out of both players' nostrils) went to Jeffrey Lisandro, who limped in on the button and then took it down with a 45,000 bet on the     flop.

After a few hands's worth of unanswered button raises and the occasional limped button and raised big blind, we got to see another flop; this hand also went Lisandro's way.

Joe Serock made the opening raise to 60,000, which Lisandro flat-called in the big blind. No further chips made their way into the pot, though, as they checked down the       board. LIsandro revealed      for a flopped straight, and it was good to take the pot.

Not much change in the stacks, though.

After all this drama, the final three hands of Willie Tann's tournament were played not with the chip leader but against Jeffrey Lisandro. Lisandro won all three - the first two small ones taken with a bet on the flop, but the third was a preflop confrontation, with small blind Tann raising pot (committing his 140k) and Lisandro nodding the assent.

Tann:        

Lisandro:        

Tann shook his head slowly as the flop came       giving his opponent two pair, and the   turn did nothing to improve his hand while the   river rubbed it in by making Lisandro a full house to send him to the rail. Still, back to back finals this year at the WSOPE - pretty impressive.

With 910,000, Joe Serock has almost double the stack of Jeffrey Lisandro (480k) and more than double Willie Tann (400k). He raised the next two hands after eliminating Madsen before giving Tann a walk for which he got a handshake and a "Thank you sir!"

Moments later, however, and a small pot came back his way from Tann, making him the first player to crack the million chip mark with 1,100,000.

...Or he did have the nuts, before he dropped them all over the floor. There was a short pause as Tann and a waitress attempted to clean up the whole bag's worth of cashew nuts that had found themselves scattered all over the place under the final table.

Jeff Madsen just can't get the better of Joe Serock today, and the last hand gave the latter         in the big blind when Madsen had raised to 85k in the small with        . Faced with 137k more to call, Madsen did so preflop and then looked ruefully at his opponent's hand as the flop brought him hope in the form of a pair of Jacks:      , but extra pairs failed to materialise on the     turn and river.

Madsen falls back into bowl-of-rice territory with 100k while Serock is back up there with 450k.

So shouted an odd-one-out railer who got a bit overexcited as Jeff Madsen moved in on a       flop after calling a Joe Serock raise to 70k preflop. It was about 120k to call, and Serock just kept looking at his hand and moving the cards around and shaking his head, finally throwing his hand away.

"I found exactly the right flop!" softly exclaimed Madsen, although he didn't show his hand and we get the feeling that exactly the right flop was any that Serock didn't like.

But doesn't seem to like any situation enough to commit more than a peek at the flop e.g. when Willie Tann raised the button (60k) and made the wavy-hand "All-in" motion on the       flop which in this game signifies, "I bet pot." He passed there, and then the next hand gave big blind Joe Serock a walk.

"You got him so scared of you now," chuckle-heckled Willie Tann, referring to the couple of times there had been an unwanted reraise from Serock. "You're a big bully, you!" No comment from Serock, but a reluctant grin from Madsen.