Matthew Ashton is wearing the one World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelet that all of the top professionals want to be wearing. It is of course Event #55: $50,000 Poker Players’ Championship, and the bracelet, $1,774,089 in prize money and the David ‘Chip’ Reese Memorial Trophy are all heading back to the home of the Beatles.
“My head I still spinning. It really hasn’t really sunk in in any shape or form.” Ashton told the PokerNews sideline reporter Lynn Gilmartin after his incredible victory.
Ashton was having the time of his life when he entered the $50k event. He was already in profit for the trip with three final table appearances; but the fact that he had not won a bracelet must have been nagging away at the young man. I spoke to him earlier in the series and he told me that as long as he kept reaching the final tables he would be happy. Consistency was more important that one solitary win.
I think he might be changing his thinking after this momentous victory.
“I always wanted to win one before, but enjoyed playing on online more. But then, after coming so close, it started to become really important to me.” Said Ashton.
The final table was a whose who of top poker talent with John Hennigan (3rd), David Benyamine (4th), George Danzer (5th) and Jonathan Duhamel (8th) all making their way to one of the biggest stages of the WSOP.
When all was said and done it was Don Nguyen who reached the heads-up stage of the tournament. Nguyen had led the event from Day Three and despite being disappointed at not winning the title; he must be over the moon from a financial perspective. Nguyen adding $1,096,254 to the $209,648 he won for the runner-up spot in Event #16: $10,000 No Limit Hold’em (NLHE) Heads-Up.
Can Matt Perrins Also Bring Gold to Britain?
Matt ‘Pez’ Perrins is the favorite to take down one of the toughest events of the calendar: Event #57: $5,000 NLHE. After three days of action Pez came into the final table as the chip leader, and high hopes of following in the footsteps of Barny Boatman and Matthew Ashton, the other two British winners at this years series.
Perrins is the only player at the final table to have won a WSOP bracelet, adding experience to his chip lead. Incredibly, Perrin’s first bracelet came in 2011 when he won a $1,500 2-7 No-Limit Lowball event, despite never playing the game before in his life.
At the time of writing Perrins is the chip leader with eight players remaining after Randal Flowers eliminated Kent Roed in ninth place. Matt Berkey and Joe Serock are also at the final table.
The Little One For One Drop is a Resounding Success
It’s great to see poker labeled as the good guy as once again the poker community have come together to improve the lives of those less fortunate. Event #58: $1,111 Little One for One Drop NLHE has generated over half a million dollars for the One Drop charity after 4,746 players entered the two starting flights to create a first prize of $663,727.
Today, sees the second day of action and at the time of writing 711-players remain with John Dolan (89k), Philip Meulyzer (86k), Bryan Piccioli (79k) and Jamie Rosen (77k) some of the bigger names floating around at the top of the chip counts. The early chip leader is Suraj Dutt with 98,125 chips.
Daniel Negreanu Leads Event #59
First it was David ‘Bakes’ Baker who dared to take the WSOP Player of the Year (POY) lead away from Daniel Negreanu, and now it’s Matthew Ashton proudly sitting on top of the pile. But if you think Negreanu was just going to sit back and let that happen then you don’t know Kid Poker very well.
Negreanu currently leads the final nine players in Event #59: $2,500 Limit 2-7 Triple Draw Lowball, with the likes of David ‘ODB’ Baker, David Chiu, Michael Mizrachi, Brian Brubaker, Eric Wasserson, Eli Elezra, Scott Seiver and Alex Condon still in tow.
282-players entered the event and the top prize is $173,236.
