Carlos Gonzales has booked a ticket to Manila as part of the NPL World Tour and pocketed almost $50,000 after winning the latest National Poker League Quarterly Final at the Goulburn Workers Club last weekend. Gonzales, who made the short trek up to Goulburn from Canberra, conquered a field of 303 players in the two-day event.
He entered the final table in third chip position (820,000 behind Ricky Lim (1,695,000) and Alison Wade (1.020,000) and leading Dean Edwards (750,000), Shan-Shan Xu (570,000), Ben Paolini (544,000), Nathan Kain (460,000) and Grant Clough-Hughes (295,000).
Lim extended his lead after sending Ben Paolini to the rail in eighth position when his Kh-7h improved to a flush against A-K. Next to go was Shan-Shan Xu, whose Ah-Jh failed to connect against the A-K of Gonzales on a board of 8-8-5-K-2, meaning the final six players would all earn NPL World Tour tickets.
Short stack Grant Clough-Hughes made his last stand with 5-6 against the Q-10 of Lim, and looked in good shape on a board of 3-5-3-3 until a 10 sailed down the river. Alison Wade then raced her pocket 10s against the A-J of Gonzales, and his momentum continued with an ace on the flop.
Nathan Kain had carefully picked his spots and finally chose to commit his chips after Lim had raised all-in from the small blind. It was Q-5 for Lim against 10-6 for Kain, with the queen playing on a board of A-J-7-8-8.
Gonzales now held a big chip lead and extended it even further when his 10-9 overtook the pocket nines of Dean Edwards as the board ran out K-10-3-Q-K. Holding an almost 5:1 chip lead, Gonzales continued to hammer away and had the chance to end it when Lim called his all-in with K-9. Gonzales showed K-Q, and he didn’t need any help from the board of 10-7-A-7-4 to be confirmed NPL Quarterly Final champion.
NPL Quarterly Final final table results
1 Carlos Gonzales $47,000 + NPLWT package
2 Ricky Lim $22,000 + NPLWT package
3 Dean Edwards $12,000 + NPLWT package
4 Nathan Kain $7000 + NPLWT package
5 Alison Wade $5000 + NPLWT package
6 Grant Clough-Hughes $3500 + NPLWT package
7 Shan-Shan Xu $4500
8 Ben Paolini $3000
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