2015 WCOOP Main Event Victory for Coenaldinho7

The flagship Main Event brought the record-breaking 2015 WCOOP to a close with Belgium’s ‘Coenaldinho7’ lifting the lion’s-share of the money in a somewhat acrimonious night of ‘deal or no deal’.

Despite “begging for a deal” before the final table had even begun, it eventually proved to be a huge success for the Belgian after defeating Poland’s ‘AlwaysiNduCe’ heads-up.

Somewhat ironically, it was the Polish player – who finished 2nd but made less than the 3rd placed Nolet20 – who was the least interested in deals throughout most of the day’s play.

Was the response from ‘AlwaysiNduCe’ when a 5-handed deal was under discussion, prompting Coenaldinho7 to reply,

Four of the players had been keen to agree on the ‘ICM’-based figures, which would have seen Coenaldinho missing out on a $1m pay-out by a mere 3 grand – something he was happy to accede to - but ‘AlwaysiNduCe’ preferred the (much sweeter for him) ‘chip chop’ version which would have seen him lift over $1.6m with the chance of 200k more to come should he win. Not surprisingly, this offer was declined by the others.

When a deal was finally struck a short while later, it was Canadian chip-leader Nolet20 who had the best of the bargain – with negotiations squeezing an extra $50K out of beertjes79 just to seal the deal – guaranteeing himself $1,223,000.

There was to be no bracelet for Nolet20 however as he was sent to the rails in 3rd place, another Belgian ‘beertjes79’ having left in 4th with an $800,000 pay-day. This left the heads-up battle for the bracelet and an extra $200,000, which went to the Belgian after a tough battle.

‘AlwaysiNduCe’ lifted exactly $1,000,000 for his runner-up spot, gaining the laudits of many watching for his no-holds-barred approach to the final table.

Jason Somerville, aka Jcarverpoker on Twitch, was full of praise for the feisty Pole when commentating on his live-stream RunItUp broadcast, whilst he himself was simultaneously trying to cash in another PokerStars 1K event.

Rather amusingly – or not perhaps for his 13,000 or so viewers –Somerville missed broadcasting the final hand of the Main Event heads-up encounter and had to replay it to see Coenaldinho7 hit a river 10 for trips, which were good enough against AlwaysiNduCe’s kings and fives.

The day’s play was full of surprises, with overnight chip-leader Alexander "joiso" Kostritsyn crashing out quickly in 8th place for $150k following a ‘disastrous river-bluff’ was looked up by ‘AlwaysiNduCe’, whose flopped set of 10’s knocked the Russian out.

With another Canadian – ‘bindernutnut’ – having already gone to the rails in 9th, picking up $100k for his efforts, it wasn’t long before two of the others fell.

K.T.A.-1985 from the Czech Republic ran into beertjes79’s club flush and left with $200k, while Ireland’s Mr.Kingball –aka ‘The Franchise’ – was another victim of the aggressive ‘AlwaysiNduCe’ approach and had to make do with a $273,000 cashout.

Nolet20’s pocket aces then took out the other Russian, ‘Ravic85’, not even needing the river ace which came. Ravic85’s 5th spot was good for $400k.

The Main Event of PokerStars record-breaking WCOOP had seen a massive 1995 entrants playing for a guaranteed prize-pool of $10million, with some 243 being paid.