News Update: April 2nd, 2012

April 2, 2012, Posted by Daniel.Smyth

In today's news update we get the latest results from Haxton & Blom's $1 million challenge, find out who took down the recent EPT and look forward to Party Poker's Premier League.

Blom Bests Haxton

Viktor Blom took another big step towards being hailed as one of the best heads-up players in the world yesterday after taking a further $82,000 from Isaac Haxton.

The pair began their $1 million battle on Saturday and after a frantic four hours of poker it was the Swede who sailed into a commanding lead of $198,438. The rollercoaster match promised much and when the high stakes titans met again yesterday and they didn’t disappoint.

A rallying start from Haxton saw him erase his deficit and edge ahead by $30,000. That high octane start didn’t last long though as Blom fought back and caused a $300,000 downswing for his American counterpart.

Haxton’s biggest mistake came when a failed bluff cost him $169,000.

blom winning

He soon made amends though when a flopped two pair was enough to best Blom’s turned pair of queens.

The tide did begin to swing in favour of Haxton 250 hands from the end of the session, but once the chips had settled it was Blom who ended the day $82,000 to the good.

The young Swede now holds a $280,000 lead over Haxton who will be looking to mount a comeback when the pair met at the felt again today.

Wrang is Champion in Campione

Jennick Wrang upheld what’s becoming a growing EPT tradition of Danish players dominating the game by taking down the latest EPT title. Following in the recent successes of his compatriots Mickey Petersen and Frederik Jensen, Wrang became the third EPT champion from Denmark in successive tournaments.

In total 507 players entered EPT Campione creating a prizepool of €640,000. The star-studded event attracted some of Europe’s best players, as well as a selection of American pros. Indeed, headlining the final table was online superstar Olivier Busquet who put in a strong performance to finish second.

On the day, however, it was the young player who qualified for just €309 that bagged the win. The result was the biggest of Wrang’s career so far and took his lifetime earnings to over $1.2 million.

Place Name Prize

1st Jannick Wrang €640,000

2nd Olivier Busquet €430,000

3rd Fabrice Soulier €240,000

4th Balazs Botond €157,000

5th Koen De Visscher €124,000

6th Mario Nagel €92,000

7th Stefano Puccilli €71,500

8th Robin Ylitalo €54,000

wrang

Let’s Have a Poker Party

This year’s much anticipated Party Poker Premier League is due to kick off on Wednesday when a host of world class players take to the felt.

Already confirmed for the event are the likes of Tony G, Tom Dwan and Sam Trickett and joining them will be two further qualifiers.

Competing over a series of final heats, a group of pros and amateurs are currently vying for one of the two available slots in the main event.

Already through to the final elimination match are: Matthew Frankland, Antony Lellouche, Dmitry Tretyakov, Amatos Gomila, Giovanni Rizzo and Peter Muelbek. These six will playoff today to see which lucky player makes it through to the $125,000 final.

Once these players have played to a conclusion a fresh batch of hopefuls will take to the felt to compete for a seat.

This year’s event looks set to be one of the most exciting ever. Indeed, if the tournaments are as good in reality as they look on paper then this will be one event not to miss.

To catch all the action visit Party Poker's live updates.