EPT11 Barcelona: High Rollers set for final table as eight players remain

While for essentially the most part its record field of 393 entries was reduced to 21 by the beginning of the day, things bogged down considerably this afternoon. At one stage play was 15 handed for a longer period, with the typical stack lowered to a trifling 26 big blinds.Finally the tournament moved past that, with the eliminations of Joao Vieira, Nicolas Chouity, Agshin Rasulov and Dylan Linde.

(left to right) Ami Barer, Jason Mercier, Ihar Soika, Benjamin Pollak, Carlos Chardha, Marc-Andre Ladouceur, Stephen Chidwick, Ismail Erkanov

Alexander Roumeliotis of Sweden would go next, but not until after a longer rear-guard that moved him up the pay-outs no less than a couple of spots. Earlier within the day Jason Mercier doubled during the Swede, who was reduced to little greater than a large blind. But he then quadrupled-up, and established a stack that while short was no less than usable. Ultimately though he fell in ninths place to make way for the one table of nine.

Pulling back: Jason Mercier

It was not until Maxim Panyak departed in ninth place, pocket jacks against the pocket kings of Ihar Soika, that a final table was in place with a line-up as follows.

Seat 1. Ismail Erkenov, 3,550,000Seat 2. Jason Mercier, 1,450,000Seat 3. Benjamin Pollak, 1,430,000Seat 4. Marc-Andre Ladouceur, 1,105,000Seat 5. Carlos Chadha, 900,000Seat 6. Stephen Chidwick, 1,800,000Seat 7. Ihar Soika, 6,700,000Seat 8. Ami Barer, 2,700,000(chip counts are approximate)

Jason Mercier and Marc-Andre Ladouceur remain the 2 PokerStars players involved. Mercier, who nursed his stack through a hard late session last night recovered well today, while Team Online's Ladouceur is purely slightly behind.

Marc-Andre Ladouceur

There's €747,200 for the winner of this event. Click here to follow live updates from the high roller event.

Follow the entire action from the tournament floor at the main EPT Barcelona page. There's hand-by-hand coverage within the panel on the top, including chip counts, and have pieces below. There's also EPTLive, that is streaming action from the overall table of the primary Event.

Stephen Bartley is a staff writer for the PokerStars Blog.

Read More... [Source: PokerStarsBlog.com :: European Poker Tour]