The final day of the P1M Guarantee Main Event has started with 66 hopefuls looking to go deep and claim the first place purse of P357,300. Only 36 players will make a profit which means, nearly half the field will fall before the money is guaranteed. We will be posting random updates of the day and the final table action right here.

1:10pm: Pangan rails Tan

Luke Pangan ends Pete Tan's day and escalates to around 390k chips. Pangan and Tan tangled in an earlier pot with Tan getting the best of Pangan but this time, Pangan would reclaim his chips and more. Pangan was all in with pocket queens against Tan's pocket eights. The board bricked and Pangan was awarded a massive pile in the middle.

1:00pm: Happy ducks for Araniel

Noel Araniel ends another player's attempt to double up when his pair of ducks overcame a coin toss against ace-queen when he landed a set to seal the deal.

12:35pm: More fall early

Bernardo Angeles was railed by Yang Zhang when his ace-four was no good against Zhang's ace-nine. Marek Weber also bowed out. Then Srinivas Polishetty who was transferred to Weber's empty seat, fell right after.

12:25pm: Sin falls first

In Sin went all in with pocket fours hoping this would be the hand to bring his stack up but was called by pocket eights and now needed to get lucky. The flop was a good one, giving Sin a set, but the turn immediately burned him as it gave his opponent a higher set.

12:20pm: Shuffle up and deal

And they are off! Good luck to all the players!

Cards are flying at the PokerStars Live Manila poker room for the final day of the P1M Guarantee Main Event. A total of 66 qualifiers from the combined results of the day one flights are batting it out for the first place purse of P357,300 plus the added value of P100,000 Macau Poker Cup package.

The Main Event saw a whopping 368 entries bringing the prize pool to P1,570,624, well over the guarantee. Only 36 players will be seeing the money, which means many short stacks will be aiming to double up as early as possible to get back in fighting contention.

Today's leader is Filipino poker pro Jessie Leonarez who ended day 1a with 240,300 chips. Day 1b chip leader Korea's Young Chull Kim is second in chip command with 203,600 chips.

In addition to the chip leaders, there are several players to certainly keep an eye on today, the Asia Player of the Year top contenders. King Lun Alan Lau from Hong Kong and Yang Zhang from China. Lau is currently second in the leader board and Zhang in fourth. With Ka Cheong Wong unable to qualify, Lau has a very good chance of stealing the first place spot from Wong if he goes the distance.

The past day one flights also saw two short stacks go from down in the dumps to riding high. At day 1a, Edward Warriner from the United Kingdom went from an ailing 3200 chips to end the day with 190,100 chips. At day 1b, Filipino player Timothy de Leon had a last level rush and went from around 8k in chips to 189,500. They are certainly players to watch out for today.

Good luck to all the players!

We will be posting updates all day so watch out for that as well.

The bubble burst with an "oh, shhhh..."

The bubble would not belong to Nick Petrangelo, who outran Ben Pollack's queen-seven with ace-eight, neither would it be Andrew Chen, for some time one of the short stacks, who was made to choose all in or fold by Byron Kaverman. Instead it was the plucky Mikita Badziakouski, who at least went down swinging.

His first bid had been a thinly veiled attempt to encourage someone to call him. Moving all in he proclaimed that he was still playing tight, something most of his likely opponents considered poppycock. "I'll even show you [my hand]. That's how much I don't want to go all-in," he said, to the amusement of those he'd yet to convince.

Out on the bubble: Mikita Badziakouski

While that time he didn't get a caller (he would show an ace), next time he'd have no such problem.

Moving in from the button behind a McDonald raise, the action got to Christopher Frank, slouched in his chair. The young German asked how much, then announced he was all in. If his plan had been to make this between him and Badziakouski, it worked. McDonald agonised for a second before stepping aside, making this a straight forward clash between Frank's ace-king, and the pocket queens of Badziakouski.

Things looked safe for Badziakouski on the flop of [7c][2c][4c] but the [3d] signalled dark clouds. It was the [5d] river card, watched by all the remaining players, that warranted the "Oh, sh**..."

Badziakouski exits on the bubble, leaving behind 11 players in the money.

"Heads up with me you're calling, right?" asked Frank of McDonald. The Canadian was still looking at the ceiling, but managed a nod.

"Two cooling hands," he finally said. "Back to back."

Bad luck for McDonald, but a stack worthy of the money, and the final table now three eliminations away.

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Dara O'Kearney had time to kill before the Malta Cup got restarted this evening. In the spirit of any poker player with some time to kill before a poker tournament gets restarted, O'Kearney played some more poker--specifically a few of the €100 "Flipouts" that were scheduled in 45-minute intervals from 5.30pm through 7pm.

There's nothing all that remarkable about that. Poker player in playing poker shocker. But O'Kearney decided to marry one of his passions with another: poker met social media as O'Kearney filmed the entire flip-out phase of the tournament to share via Periscope. This was a rare chance for a player's eye perspective of an entire tournament.

If you're au fait with neither "Flipouts" nor Periscope, this will likely need some explanation, not least because the use of electronic devices--video-capturing devices in particular--are prohibited if one has live cards. Periscope is a live-streaming platform, allowing short video clips to be shared in real time (YouTube meets Twitter), so a video-capture device is certainly required.

But in truth, there's very little danger to a game's integrity to film the opening stage of a "Flipout" tournament. Players get only two chips, one of which he or she is obliged to gamble on the first hand, regardless of cards, and the second of which must be gambled on the second.

There are no decisions to be made, no strategy to be applied. In the vast majority of cases, ones tournament lasts precisely two hands (ie., as long as it takes to lose those two chips) and then it's off to find something else to do.

(The winner of each table in a "Flipout" tournament then goes through to a final and plays some proper poker to declare an overall champion.)

I first got wind of O'Kearney's Periscope/Flipout intentions via a tweet that landed in PokerStars Blog's Twitter timeline. Twitter said that the tweet had been sent 25 minutes ago, and after clicking on to it, it quickly became clear how successful O'Kearney's tournament had been. The landing page for the particular Periscope clip said the broadcast had finished 24 minutes ago.

Yep, O'Kearney went whiff, whiff and the tournament was done within a minute, despite a slightly wishful comment appearing in Periscope's live chat box from someone identifying himself as "DKLappin" (rumoured to be O'Kearney's friend and countryman David Lappin) saying, "Get there." He didn't.

Approximately 44 minutes later, O'Kearney was back at the felt and again the camera was turned on. The result, however, was something very similar. Whiff, whiff, out.

The third tweet was as plaintive as it was inevitable. "LIVE on #Periscope: Last chance in the flipouts at EPT Malta." Sorry to say that not even a live-action Lappin on the rail, sticking his thumb up on queue when the camera swivelled in his direction, could rescue O'Kearney. He lost both hands again.

"I've never even had a sweat," O'Kearney said soon after, once he had settled back into the Malta Cup field. "I've lost 12 from 12."

The final three "Flipouts" of EPT Malta are played tomorrow, at 5.30pm, 6.15pm and 7pm. Can O'Kearney complete the clean sweep? Fifteen from 15? Tune into Periscope to find out.

Everything about EPT Malta is on the main EPT Malta page. More specifically, all the hand-by-hand coverage of the €25,000 High Roller is on the €25,000 High Roller page and everything from the IPT Main Event is on the IPT Main Event page.

No really, begin plotting your own bid for EPT glory by downloading the PokerStars client and having a crack. Follow this EPT event via the EPT app. There you will get all the latest news, chip counts and payouts. You can download it on Android or IOS

What exactly do you say to the player you just busted in what was likely the biggest hand of the high roller event so far? All that Byron Kaverman could manage was "good game."

To back up a little, this one had been huge. It was started by Charlie Carrel, who bet 50,000 from the cut off, not knowing it would be the last he would play. Kaverman was on the button, and three-bet to 125,000. Back on Carrel he then four bet to 425,000, leaving himself 475,000 behind. Kaverman called.

Charlie Carrel (left) and Byron Kaverman

By now this was the kind of hand that gets a bit of attention, playing on in total silence, gripping (and free) entertainment for the rest of the table. The flop came [kh][4d][2c] which Carrel bet at, making it 125,000. Kaverman raised his hand, like you would if you were about to drop it on the table to make a fruitless check. But after counting what Carrel had left he called, watching a [qh] arrive on the turn.

Then came some thinking, only this time it was all Carrel's part. In hindsight it turned out he was thinking what to do with his jack-nine bluff. His options now were limited. Check, and maybe hope Kaverman felt the same way and go for a lucky river. Or shove and hope to goodness that it would be enough to make Kaverman think Carrel's action denoted unbeatable strength.

Carrel chose shove.

Kaverman snap called. Carrel new he was beaten even before Kaverman showed aces.

Which leaves the question of what you say to a man in that situation, dusted off after bluffing off his chips against an almost unstoppable hand?

"Did you say good game?" asked Benjamin Pollack.

"What? Replied Kaverman, momentarily distracted stacking up more than two million chips. "Yeah I did. It wasn't a needle!"

Byron Kaverman

Others at the table laughed in that nervous way you might if something potentially bad nearly happened to you, but didn't.

"You can't say 'unlucky'," suggested Pollack, not in these circumstances.

"Nice try?" joked the dealer.

"That's even worse!" said the now grinning Kaverman.

Either way he's up, and Carrel is out.

Very well played indeed.

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The "quintuple stud" tournament is under way in Malta, which represents a unique challenge to players, reporters and the people who write the festival tournament schedule brochure alike.

Let's start with the latter: They have only a tiny on with which to describe a tournament in the at-a-glance festival line-up, but "quintuple stud" doesn't quite describe what this is all about.

More particularly, this is a six-handed tournament in which you play a rotation of five stud games. First up, it's seven-card stud, then seven-card hi/lo, then seven-card razz, then seven card super stud hi/lo and then five-card stud. They are all similar, but they are all different (and I'll confess, I don't know what makes super stud super). But at least 30 players here do and have come out to join the fray.

Among them is the man who has the best reason to remember this room fondly: Jean Montury. Having mastered no-limit hold-em this time last season--he won the main event--Montury is making his first appearance of this season's EPT Malta in the quintuple stud.

It's a tough one to live-blog. I watched one hand, during a seven-card hi/lo round, and poor Olli Kokko was required to declare himself eliminated at the end of it. His opponents and the dealer were still pondering who had won what of the two pots on offer--Kokko was all in on fourth street--but Kokko knew the game was up.

After Tobias Hausen, who won the razz here last year, paid the bring in with the [4d] exposed, Bas de Laat called with [jd] up and Kokko raised with [qh] showing. The other two called. The betting then capped when the three had the [9h], [8s] and [5s] added to their exposed cards, respectively. And I totally lost track of what money was going in when the [ac], [kd], [Ts] came next.

By this point Kokko was definitely all in, so Hausen and De Laat were piling cash into a side pot. The [6d], [7h], [7s] were the next out and then they all got their final down card too.

A load more betting ensued--this really is first rate coverage, isn't it. Bookmark. This. Page!--and they all flipped over their hands.

Hausen showed [2h][6c][ah] to go with his [4d][5s][Ts][7s].
De Laat had [7d][jh][8d] to go with his [jd][8s][kd][7h].
Kokko had [qs][2s][4c] to go with his [qh][9h][ac][6d].

When all was said and done, Hausen won the low with his ace-to-six and De Laat won the high with his two pair, jacks and eights. Meanwhile Kokko said, "One pair, no low," handed his tournament ticket to the dealer and headed off, very politely.

Montury and Fabrice Soullier are still involved at this point, as the tournament officials announced the prize pool details. There were 31 players, five places paid and few grand for the winner.

In the tournament area adjacent to the quintuple stud, the ladies event was also in its early stages. There are 55 players in that one--another fine turnout--and a decent whack up for grabs to whoever takes that down later this evening.

Jennifer Shahade, the PokerStars Mind Sport Ambassardor, is wearing the Red Spade.

Everything about EPT Malta is on the main EPT Malta page. More specifically, all the hand-by-hand coverage of the €25,000 High Roller is on the €25,000 High Roller page and everything from the IPT Main Event is on the IPT Main Event page.

No really, begin plotting your own bid for EPT glory by downloading the PokerStars client and having a crack. Follow this EPT event via the EPT app. There you will get all the latest news, chip counts and payouts. You can download it on Android or IOS

We've a confession to make. We don't know a great deal about the chip leader of this event - although we're learning more level by level. Quan Zhou held the lead at the end of Day 1 and almost 40% of the way through Day 2 he's still looking down on the rest of the field. He's the only player to have more than a million chips to his name and subsequently he's also the only player with over a 100 big blinds (the big blind is currently 12,000).

A quick google will uncover a bit more about his poker prowess and inform you that he's won just over $420,000 in tournaments since his maiden cash in June 2011. A quick scan will also uncover a reason why we don't know too much about him, 18 of his 23 cashes are in tournaments held in Asia. All of this doesn't though give us any more information on how he plays poker or what sort of style he employs at the table.

However a hand he just played against Paul Newey gave the PokerStars Blog - and his opponent's - an insight into how he approaches some situations in poker. In the hand in question Newey shoved for 143,000 from under-the-gun+1 and action folded to Zhou who was in the small blind. With blinds at 6,000/12,000 ante 2,000 it meant that the Chinese player was facing a shove of right around 12 big blinds.

It soon become clear that he had a fairly close decision to make as he got a count of Newey's shove and slipped his headphones off so he could think more clearly. He took out the 137,000 more he needed to call and stcked them in one tower. He then stood up and stared at Newey, puffed out his cheeks to exhale and sat back down.

The biggest chip in play right now is worth 25,000 and Zhou has a lot of them. They were the last tower on the left of his chip stack and he slid them to the far right so he could cut them down. They totalled 675,000 and were soon rehoused from whence they'd came. We can assume Zhou is right handed, not just because around 90% of the world are, he was stroking the tower of chips that totalled 137,000 with his right hand and suddenly looked up to once again try and get information from Newey. He smiled at the Englishman and Newey smiled right back.

Another 10 seconds passed and Zhou then pushed his cards towards the muck, no sooner had he done so then Charlie Carrel, who had a stack of around 435,000, folded from the big blind and said: "I've folded, don't muck I want to see what you were thinking about calling with."

"Can I show?" asked Zhou as he went to retrieve his cards from the muck but only one was easily identifiable and so he could show just the [Ac]. "I had ace-ten suited," he said to Carrel, who assured Zhou that with that holding it really was a close decision and his tanking was more than justified. Newey was game too as he turned over the [6s] indicating, so the table believed, that his other card was also likely a six.

And with that the game continued, on the next hand Newey raised and when it got to Zhou he mucked his cards with zero fanfare and went back to doing something on his phone.

Everything about EPT Malta is on the main EPT Malta page. More specifically, all the hand-by-hand coverage of the €25,000 High Roller is on the €25,000 High Roller page and everything from the IPT Main Event is on the IPT Main Event page.

Begin plotting your own bid for EPT glory by downloading the PokerStars client and having a crack. Follow this EPT event via the EPT app. There you will get all the latest news, chip counts and payouts. You can download it on Android or IOS

Quan Zhou ended the day yesterday as chip leader. Right now he seems intent on doing the same today.

Dressed in a three-piece suit, albeit without the third piece, he has on a pressed white shirt, polished leather shoes, a grey scarf, and a rather nice wrist watch that's not fastened tightly enough. He also wears headphones, most likely to avoid hearing the comments others make when he takes their chips.

Quan Zhou (taken earlier in the event)

That certainly applied to Vladimir Troyanovskiy earlier.

The Russian had raised to 24,000 in the hijack before Zhou three-bet to 66,000 from the small blind. The flop came [6h][8h][9h] which was checked. Zhou then bet 58,000 on the [6s] turn. Troyanovskiy called that, and called again when Zhou bet another 170,000 on the [2c] river card.

Zhou had flopped the straight, turning over [td][7d]

Zhou is a quiet man, most likely because he speaks little English, which makes him something of an oddity on the Tour, the odd one out on a table full of youngish Europeans. So he lets the cards talk for him. Like when he turned over his cards, sending Troyanovskiy into a personal moment of regret and contemplation. Zhou flicked his cards an inch or so forward again, as if to remind Troyanovskiy that, regrets aside, it was time to pay up.

Troyanovskiy did, which pushed Zhou's stack up to around 1.3 million. Then he returned his head to his hands. To be clear, this wasn't despair, it's what Troyanovskiy normally does. But there was no mistaking some irritation. More so a short while later as Zhou won two more pots in quick succession, moving up to 1.5 million.

So far so good for Zhou.

There are many ways to keep score in poker but the most traditional one is winnings. Money talks after all. So imagine having accumulated over $1,100,000 in live tournament earnings and being the pauper of the bunch as everyone else at your table had accumulated at least $2,500,000. That sounds insane, unbelievable even, but it was the situation that Chris Hunichen found himself in when he sat down at the start of Day 2 in the €25,000 High Roller and was faced with this motley crew of opponents.

Before you shed a tear for Hunichen whilst he might 'only' have won a little over $1,100,000 in live tournaments he's racked up over $7,750,000 in online winnings under the screename 'Big Huni'. He's a multiple online Triple Crown winner and there aren't too many major online tournaments he hasn't won. He's not exactly the sucker in this line-up, but then who is?

Here's a look at some of their collective achievements:

- Over $48,000,000 in live tournament earnings
- 47 outright tournament victories (Mercier has 18 alone)
- six victories in $10k+ buy-ins outside of PokerStars tours.
- four EPT High Roller titles
- three WSOP bracelets
- two EPT titles
- two NAPT Bounty Shootout titles
- two Eureka High Roller titles

In short they know how to close. There are no easy tables in events with a buy-in of €25,000, but if there's a harder one in the room we're yet to find it.

Everything about EPT Malta is on the main EPT Malta page. More specifically, all the hand-by-hand coverage of the €25,000 High Roller is on the €25,000 High Roller page and everything from the IPT Main Event is on the IPT Main Event page.

Begin plotting your own bid for EPT glory by downloading the PokerStars client and having a crack. Follow this EPT event via the EPT app. There you will get all the latest news, chip counts and payouts. You can download it on Android or IOS