October 04 2011, Donnie Peters

Day 4 concluded on Tuesday at the 2011 PokerStars.com European Poker Tour London Poker Festival Main Event with 24 players remaining. Leading the way is Mattias Bergstrom with 1.838 million in chips.

Neil Pearce was the last player eliminated before action came to a halt for the day. He finished in 25th place and went out at the hands of Jeremy Kottler. Pearce was all-in preflop holding pocket sevens, up against Kottler who was holding queens. No help came on the flop, turn or river and Pearce was off to the payout desk, while Kottler raked in the pot. He bagged 1.693 million for the night, putting him in fourth place overall heading into Day 5.

Pearce wasn’t the only player to go on Day 4. When play began, 62 players remained. Some of those to fall on the day included Barny Boatman (57th), Jamie Rosen (49th), Daniel Neilson (45th), Marvin Rettenmaier (41st), Steven Kelly (39th) and Roberto Romanello (37th).

A few Team PokerStars Pros also hit the rail: Ana Marquez (42nd), Humberto Brenes (32nd) and Salvatore Bonavena (29th).

Bonavena was the last Team Pro to hit the rail and was eliminated by Basile Yaiche. Bonavena was all-in preflop with against Yaiche’s two fours. Although he flopped a king, Bonavena couldn’t stave elimination as a four fell on the river to give Yaiche a winning set. There is still one Team Pro remaining in the field – Juan Manuel Pastor from Spain. He’ll go into Day 5 with just under one million in chips at 960,000.

Joao Barbosa, winner of EPT Warsaw in 2008, Benny Spindler, James Mitchell, 2010 Irish Open champion, Kevin Iacofono, Martins Adeniya and Steve O’Dwyer[/b] have also made it to Day 5. Sebastian Blom, brother of Viktor Blom, will be the shortest stack returning with 59,000 in chips.

Day 5 Table and Seat Draw

The final 24 players will return Wednesday at 1200 BST (0400 PDT) for another day of play as the tournament moves towards the final table. Once the final eight are set, play will end for the day. Be sure to return to PokerNews for all of the live coverage.

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September 22 2011, Donnie Peters

The World Poker Tour Malta resumed play on Wednesday with the second starting flight. Day 1b added 139 players to the field and brought the total entries to 240, which created a prize pool of “698,400. At the end of the day, Tommy Vedes finished on top, with a stack of 115,500.

Plenty of notables were in action, and some of them for the second time in this re-entry event, including John Eames, Sam El Sayed, Ivan Freitez, Steven Kelly, Dragan Galic, McLean Karr and Phil Hellmuth. Out of that bunch, only Eames, Galic and Hellmuth were able to advance, and all three did with relatively low numbers of chips. Hellmuth bagged up 34,075, Galic finished with 23,350 and Eames finished with the smallest stack moving to Day 2 with 17,100. They’ll all have plenty of work cut out for them on Thursday.

At the end of the day, 90 players remained from the 139 that started. Combining those survivors with the ones from Day 1a, the returning field for Day 2 will be 154 players. Everyone will be chasing Day 1a chip leader Fabien Sartoris, but there’s still plenty of firepower left in the field to provide some great poker action.

Among those advancing to Day 2 are Antoine Saout, Marvin Rettenmaier, Sofia Lovgren, Tobias Reinkemeier, Steve O’Dwyer and William Thorson. Some of the other players who fell on Day 1b in their last chance to move on were Davidi Kitai, Fabrice Soulier, Kara Scott and James Akenhead.

Day 2 will take place on Thursday, beginning at 1600 CEST (1500 BST). PokerNews will have the recap from the day’s action after it is complete, so be sure to stay tuned.

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*Photo courtesy of the World Poker Tour

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