Day 2 Recap: Moorman Closes in on Christensen

Level 14: 1,200-2,400, 400 ante

(Photo: Morten Christensen)

When it comes to European poker, Denmark is in the midst of a poker renaissance. Jannick Wrang, Frederik Jensen and Mickey Petersen have all won major European titles in the past few months, and so it should come as no surprise to learn that the leader of WPT Vienna Day 2 is also Danish.

Not many people would have heard of Morten Christensen before today. The online qualifier has only cashed in three live events and currently lies 352nd in the all-time Danish money list. It's a good job we have the Hendon Mob to be able to look up these statistics, because without them you would have thought he had been cashing in live events for years. The Dane finished with a sumptuous looking 483,000 chips and is in great shape to add cash number four to his resume.

Rest is very important for poker players; good nights sleep a necessity. But someone failed to tell Roberto Romanello. The WPT Champions Club member decided to play in the 48-hr Big Cash Game until 05.00 this morning! Despite the lack of sleep Romanello's chirpy little voice was heard regularly throughout the day and he made it into the draw for Day 3.


(Photo: Roberto Romanello)

The chip leader from the combined day one's was Darko Stojanovic and he started Day 2 in the same fashion that he wrapped up Day 1B. Yesterday he ended the day by disposing of McLean Karr and today Fabrice Soulier suffered the same fate. The Frenchman losing a flip for his tournament life and Stojanovic immediately stretched his lead at the top.


(Photo: Darko Stojanovic)

The first player to try and grab hold of Stojanovic's coat tails was WPT Player of the Year Andy Frankenberger. Frankenberger grafted his way to 115,000 before doubling that to 230,000 when he his pocket kings ran into the pocket queens of Thomas Muhlocker. But our WPT Champions Club member suffered a frustrating day after that early promise, culminating in an all-in at the death, when his pocket kings were out flopped by Yohann Aube's pocket queens. Frustrated he may have been but the flame haired one still has his name in the bag for Day 3.


(Photo: Andy Frankenberger)

Earlier in the day we ran into Ben Wilinofsky. The Canadian sensation has had a miserable time while in Vienna having suffered the ignominy of losing three out of his four heats in the WPT Special Event PartyPoker Premier League. Add a little illness into the mix and it bodes for a bad day at the office, but Wilinofsky is made of sterner stuff, and midway through Level 11 he turned WPT Vienna on its head with two high profile eliminations. The first player to feel the might of Wilinofsky was Michael Tureniec and the Swede's elimination pushed Wilinofsky into the top three spots. But then the most amazing cooler pushed into the top spot. Vincenzo Natale finished Day 1B with 133,300 chips and a bright future in WPT Vienna. That was until Wilinofsky got his claws into him. Wilinofsky flopped quad fours before the ace on the turn handed Natale aces full. The carnage on the river ended up with a dumbfounded Natale leaving the competition and Wilinofsky rising to the number one spot and 410,000 chips.


(Photo: Ben Wilinofsky)

Xuan Liu, Todd Terry, Jonathan Duhamel, Adam Levy and ElkY departed in Level 12, and they were joined by Dominik Nitsche, Sam El Sayed, Ludovic Lacay, Faraz Jaka, Nicolas Cardyn, Ronny Kaiser and Toby Lewis who were eliminated in Level 13. All eyes were on the stream of quality leaving the tournament floor when the giant killer struck again. This time the victim was Steve O'Dwyer and once again it was the river that proved to be the winner for Stojanovic. O'Dwyer laid a nice little trap for Stojanovic when he flatted pre flop with pocket kings. Three streets later on a board of 5x 3x 2x 7 4 and Stojanovic had rivered a straight holding Ax 6x and O'Dwyer was on to his next tournament.


(Photo: Steve O'Dwyer)

If you play the Stojanovic way then sooner or later you are going to lose chips, and so it proved to be the case. By the time Stojanovic had been moved to the direct left of Morten Christensen he had whittled himself down to 250,000 chips. Stojanovic and Christensen finished the day with some interesting battles, but none that threatened to get too out of hand. In fact right at the death it was Chris Moorman who became Christensen’s main threat for the chip lead turning 70,000 chips into 400,000 chips. Amazed at his chip growing feat we asked him to talk us through the big pots

“I haven’t had any,” said the modest Moorman.


(Photo: Chris Moorman)

So congratulations to our chip leader Morten Christensen. Day 3 will resume at 13.00 (CET) Friday.