Poker History For Ying Lin Chua
Monday, 7 March 2016
Malaysian poker player Ying Lin Chua secured a little piece of tournament history last week after taking down the largest freezeout competition ever to be held in the Asia-Pacific region.
Held at the PokerStars Live Macau poker room inside the City Of Dreams casino as part of the Macau Poker Cup 24 tournament series, the 'Red Dragon' competition attracted 1,075 runners to generate a top prize of HK$1,904,000 ($245,169), which eventually went the way of Chua after he defeated Chinese opponent Wayne Zhang heads-up.
The victory in the HK$12,000 ($1,545) buy-in main event represented the biggest of Chua’s poker career and continued the conference manager’s hot streak as he also tasted victory in the National Philippines competition from the World Poker Tour (WPT) in early-January for $86,180.
Following a frantic start to the final table, play eventually reached something of an impasse three-handed and a deal to split the money was soon being discussed between Chua, Zhang and Japanese competitor Takashi Ogura. Although initial negotiations broke down, a further 90 minutes without a single elimination finally prompted the chop with Chua taking the biggest chunk and leaving HK$300,000 ($38,629) on the table.
Chua got his hands on that money as well after eliminating first Ogura and then Zhang to write his name into the annals of Asia-Pacific poker history.
“I feel super fantastic,” Chua told event co-sponsor PokerStars.
“I really didn’t expect something coming to me so soon [after the WPT win]”.
Macau Poker Cup 24 Main Event Results:
1 Ying Lin Chua (Malaysia) - HK$1,904,000 ($245,169)
2 Wayne Zhang (China) - HK$1,307,000 ($168,288)
3 Takashi Ogura (Japan) - HK$1,382,000 ($177,945)
4 Liang Xu (China) - HK$611,000 ($78,673)
5 Chengbei Lei (China) - HK$413,000 ($53,178)
6 Fan Xie (China) - HK$302,100 ($38,898)
7 Yang Zhang (China) - HK$257,000 ($33,091)
8 Tom Alner (UK) - HK$223,500 ($28,778)
9 Yongqiang Huang (China) - HK$190,000 ($24,464)
Image courtesy of PokerStars
Tags:
PokerStars Live Macau, City Of Dreams, Red Dragon, Macau Poker Cup 24, Ying Lin Chua, Wayne Zhang, Takashi Ogura, Liang Xu, Chengbei Lei, Fan Xie, Yang Zhang, Macau, Tom Alner, Yongqiang Huang, PokerStars