December 16 2011, Donnie Peters

The Epic Poker League continued on with Day 3 of the third Main Event as 25 players returned for play. The plan for the day was to play down until the money bubble broke and 12 players were left. The end came just about five hours after the first cards were dealt and leading the way was Joe Tehan with 1.142 million in chips.

Tehan got his chips thanks to a big double knockout on the last hand of the day to burst the bubble. His closest competitor is Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi with 627,500 and then Scott Clements rounds out the top three with 496,000.

Matt Graham was the first to go on the day. According to the EPL Live Update Team, Graham moved his last 31,500 into the middle during Level 10 with the blinds at 1,200/2,400/400. He was called by Brock Parker holding the . Graham held the , but the ladies couldn’t hold up after the board ran out .

From there, Hasan Habib fell in 24th, Yevgeniy Timoshenko was eliminated in 23rd, Eric Froehlich headed out the door in 22nd and Dan O’Brien hit the rail in 21st.

Sam Stein fell in 20th place after his failed to fend of Amnon Filippi’s and Justin Smith’s couldn’t beat Tehan’s , which sent him out the door in 19th.

After the eliminations of Marco Johnson in 18th, Randal Flowers in 17th, Eric Baldwin in 16th and Parker in 15th, just 14 players remained. Now just two places away from the money and a $51,920 payday, the unthinkable happened.

Faraz Jaka was nursing the short stack of the tournament when he raised all-in from under the gun for 68,000 with the blinds at 2,000/4,000/500. Action moved to Vanessa Rousso and she reraised to 120,000 with around 180,000 behind. When play got over to Tehan, he requested a count on Rousso’s stack and then reraised all-in. After some thinking, Rousso called and put herself at risk along with Jaka.

Jaka was fortunate enough to pick up at this very key moment. He was looking for the triple up against Rousso’s and Tehan’s . Wait, what? That’s right, Tehan held the ol’ deuce-four offsuit. What happened from there, we can’t really put into words.

What we can tell you is that the flop, turn and river ran out and Tehan had spiked trip fours to miraculously win the hand and bust both Jaka and Rousso on the bubble to end the day. Stunned, both players headed to the rail while the other 12 remained to bag up their chips for the day.

Day 4 Chip Counts

The final 12 players will return on Saturday at 1200 PST (2100 CET) and continue with three four-handed tables of action. PokerNews will have the recap from play, so be sure to check right back here for it on Sunday.

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November 06 2011, Donnie Peters

The 2011 World Poker Tour Amneville has reached the final table after Day 4′s action on Saturday. There are six players remaining and leading the way is start-of-the-day chip leader Scott Baumstein. He’ll take 3.91 million in chips into the final table, good enough for nearly 1.3 million more than his closest competitor.

When the day began, 19 players returned to the felt. Ovidiu Balaj was the first player to exit and he was followed out the door by Nicolas Dervaux. Notables Jean-Philipe Rohr fell in 15th place and Arnaud Mattern in 14th. Both Rohr and Mattern were eliminated on the same hand.

According to the WPT Live Update Team, in Level 20, with the blinds at 5,000/10,000/1,000, Adrien Allain raised to 22,000 from the button. Mattern three-bet to 66,000 from the small blind, and Rohr four-bet jammed for 151,000 from the big blind. Allain called and Mattern also called.

The flop came down and Rohr was all-in awaiting his fate. Mattern led with a bet of 80,000 and Allain moved all-in. Mattern snap-called and tabled top set with . Allain held and Rohr, who was all-in preflop, held .

Mattern had gone from worst to first, but quickly fell behind again when the landed on the turn to give Allain the best hand. The river landed with the and Allain’s trip aces were the winner. He had the most chips in the hand to eliminate both of his opponents.

Another notable player who everyone had their eyes on was 2010 World Series of Poker November Niner Joseph Cheong. Cheong began the day fourth in chips, but fell in 13th place. His failed to get there against Tony Blanchandin’s pocket tens after all of the money went in preflop.

The official final table for WPT Amneville was set after Anders Bisgaard fell in seventh place during Level 24. With the blinds at 12,000/24,000/4,000, Allain made it 50,000 to go and Thibaud Guenegou called from the small blind. Bisgaard reraised all-in from the big blind and Allain quickly called. Guenegou folded and showed that he was laying down pocket nines. Allain held pocket aces again and Bisgaard pocket jacks. The board of was no help to Bisgaard and he was eliminated.

Final Table Chip Counts

The final table will commence at 1500 CET (0600 PDT). Each of the final six players has locked up $65,618 and first place is worth $452,816. Be sure to return to PokerNews for the final table recap.

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*Photo courtesy of the World Poker Tour.

Follow Donnie Peters on Twitter – @Donnie_Peters