Poker News

Poker legend Johnny Chan has busted out of the World Series of Poker Main Event after a disastrous few hours in Las Vegas.

The 53-year-old had entered Day 6 as one of the favourites in ninth place with nearly 2.6 million in chips.

But the two-time world champion could only manage a 156th place finish after his huge stack was nearly wiped out when he clashed with another frontrunner, Robert Pisano.

Somebody was always going to double-up in the hand, in which Chan's pocket kings ran into Pisano's aces. It was the latter – leaving Chan dangerously short-stacked early in the day.  He never recovered and was eliminated less than an hour later.

Other big names to hit the rail overnight were Pokerjolt columnist JP Kelly, Jesper Hougaard, Jimmy Tran, Robert Mizrachi, Tomer Berda, Phil Galfond, Russell Rosenblum, the brilliantly-named Todd Witteles, and Matt Keikoan.

Californian Breeze Zuckerman was also eliminated. She was the last female in this year’s Main Event, finishing 121st and taking home an enormous cheque for $57,102. Not bad for six days work.

Chip leader heading into Day 7 is Theo Jorgensen from Copenhagen, Denmark. He currently has 9,300,000 in chips, an advantage of more than two million over the surrounding pack.

Just 78 players now remain in the fight for the biggest prize in poker. Friday night's session will see that trimmed to just 27 survivors - three tables.

On Saturday the final – 'November' - nine will be determined. These players will return later in the year to play down to a new world champion and the $9million first prize.