News / Matthew Pitt / 13 July 2009 / Leave a comment

Of the 407 players who returned to The Rio for Day 5 of the $10,000 World Championship No-Limit Hold'em Event, just two were wearing the colours of Betfair Poker, Sorel Mizzi and tcmoriera.

Mizzi started the day with a healthy 305,000 in chips, more than enough for the young Canadian to grind away with. Unfortunately for Mizzi, he suffered a big loss during the first couple of levels which basically left him in push or fold mode.

He ended up shoving with Ace-Jack offsuit and was eventually looked up by Scott Cook who held 9s9d. Team betfair have had horrendous luck when facing all-in bets against pocket nines and this hand would be no different as Cook flopped a set on a board reading 9c6c3d.

The turn brought a glimmer of hope as the King of clubs meant any club, apart from the 3c would give him a winning flush but it was not meant t be as the Th fell on the river to eliminate him in 366th place from 6,494 runners, worth $27,469 This was Mizzi's fifth cash of the 2009 World Series of Poker, a cash which took his winning for the series to a few dollars shy of $370,000, not bad for a few weeks poker playing.

Meanwhile tcmoriera was busy trying to add to his 253,000 starting stack and did so when he called a 22,000 raise from middle position in the big blind with a pair of black fives. Both players checked the flop of Ts9s7s but tcmoriera lead out for 27,000 when the Ks arrived on the turn. The initial raiser flat called and both checked again when the As was dealt on the river. Somehow tcmoriera won the pot with his baby flush to take him to around 325,000 chips.

He was then unlucky to lose with a full house to a bigger full house when the board ran out 8x2xQx2x8x and his opponent showed Jx8x whilst tcmoriera opted to show one of his cards, a two. This left him with around 175,000 and in need of a double up sooner rather than later.

His exit hand occurred very close to Mizzi's departure when he decided to shove his Jack-Two offsuit over the top of a player who had been habitually raising preflop. This time the raise woke up with Ace-Jack and made the call. Tcmoriera was in bad shape when the first two cards dealt were Aces and the remaining three were not the required 222 and he headed for the cashier's office with a slip for $29,911, the biggest live cash of his career.

Despite there no longer being any remaining members of Team Betfair still standing, there are still plenty of big name pros left in the field including Phil Ivey and last year's winner Peter Eastgate, so we will still be following with great interest over the next couple of days. There is also a splattering of British and European players left in with James Akenhead currently sitting in ninth place with 2,692,000 chips.

The best of luck to each of the remaining 185 players.