Macau Poker Cup 27: Ankush Prasad Sole Indian to Make Red Dragon Main Event Day 3; Paawan Bansal Finishes Runners-Up in HK$1,500 Flipout

The Macau Poker Cup (MPC) 27 Red Dragon Main Event that is being hosted at the PokerStars LIVE Macau poker room played out Day 2 yesterday with 410 survivors starting the proceedings. After seven levels, the field was decimated to a mere 81 players.

A total 1,308 entries turned up across three starting flights to make this the largest-ever Red Dragon field in the history of the tour. A bigger accomplishment is the fact that this is the largest-ever live freezeout tournament to be hosted in the Asia-Pacific region.

10 Indian players namely Ankush Prasad, Pradeep Nudurumati, Prashant Jain Bhutoria, Manoj Pentakota, Mayank Agarwal, Nishant Sharma, Saurabh Jain, Sumit Sapra, Raghav Bansal and Akshay Nasa made Day 2 of the event but barring Prasad, all the remaining players hit the rails before the end of play.

Apart from Prasad who is assured to cash, Pradeep Nudurumati, Prashant Jain Bhutoria and Manoj Pentakota were the other three Indians who made it in the money.

Meanwhile, Liwei Chen won a side event title.

Red Dragon Main Event – Day 2

Day 2 of the Macau Poker Cup Main Event saw 410 hopefuls returning back, all aiming to slay the dragon as the survivors from the three-starting flight got together for the first time.

With the top 162 places getting paid, 248 players were to miss the money bus, and after seven 60-minute levels there are just 81 contenders remaining.

New Zealand’s Thomas Ward managed to bag a massive stack after going through a rollercoaster ride all day. He was one of the shorter stacks at the start but climbed up quickly grabbing the chip lead before taking some big hits and dropping back down. However, he powered back into contention to finish the day with an impressive 1,246,000 stack – over 400,000 more than second best stack of Yuefeng Pan (819,000).

10 challengers from Team India were in thick of action on Day 2 but unfortunately only Ankush Prasad (140,000) managed to slide through to Day 3.

Pradeep Nudurumati, Prashant Jain Bhutoria and Manoj Pentakota were the three other Indian players who cashed in the event. Nudurumati finished 83^rd for HK$37,450 (~₹3,06,901), Bhutoria exited the event in 125^th place for HK$34,050 (~₹2,79,038) and Pentakota pocketed HK$30,650 (~₹2,51,175) for his 158^th place finish.

Indian Challengers Update:

Notables who couldn’t make in the money were Team PokerStars Pro Celina Lin, former Asia Player of the Year Kitty Kuo, and Baby Dragon champions Derx Lai & Feng Wen Chen.

Start of the day chip leader Jesus Espinoza Fernadez was one of the early casualties in the money and defending champion Alan Lau also fell on Day 2 but cashed.

Some other notables who are still in the running include Korea’s Steve Yea (310,000), Macau Millions winner Justin Chan (364,000) and inaugural Baby Dragon champion Bobby Zhang (335,000).

Top 10 Chip Counts at the End of Day 2

1. Thomas Ward – 1,247,000
2. Yuefeng Pan – 819,000
3. Andy Chan – 698,000
4. Seung Yong Yi – 694,000
5. Calvin Tan – 680,000
6. Yuanhang Zhong – 638,000
7. Kuan Hsiang Huang – 635,000
8. Lingnan Hu – 630,000
9. Bo Ouyang – 613,000
10. Wei Yang – 544,000

Event 25: Bubble Rush

The HK$8,000 Bubble Rush event drew 151 entries to create a massive HK$1,054,584 prize pool. China’s Liwei Chen defeated Korea’s Naecheug Jung in the heads-up battle after a deal to chop the money equally was agreed upon.

Final Table Results (HKD)

1. Liwei Chen – HK$224,100

2. Naecheug Jung – HK$224,100

3. Liang Xu – $116,000

4. Ben Lai – HK$89,984

5. Leon Li Ta Hsu – HK$73,800

6. Bao Qiang Ho – HK$60,600

7. Hua Ming – HK$50,000

8. Masato Shimizu – HK$39,500

9. Mike Takayama – HK$29,000

Keep following the latest updates from Macau Poker Cup 27 on PokerGuru!