Chip daddy Peter Harkes opened to 45,000 under the gun and it folded around to David Janssen on the button who shoved for 225,000. That was apparently mere pocket change to Harkes; he made the call, and they were on their backs.

Harkes:
Janssen: – very nice

Board:

Janssen is now up to half a million and is no longer the short stack. Harkes barely felt it and remains chip leader on around 1.5 million.

Maksim Martynov opened to 35,000 preflop before Loek van Wely came in with a three-bet to 85,000. The Latvian refused to go away however and cold four-bet to 170,000. That was too much for van Wely who mucked his hand quickly.

Blinds are now 10k/20k/2k.

Loek van Wely, one of our three Dutchmen at this final table, opened to 40,000 but soon faced a reraise to 96,000 from Jarkko Mammela. Van Wely made the call, but he check-folded to a bet from Mammela on the flop and the first significant pot of the day went to Finland.

The players are now at the table and the announcements have been made; with around 20 minutes left of the 8k/16k/1.5k level, it is shuffle up and deal!

We’re just waiting for the players to be seated.

It’s the final countdown here in Riga. We’re down to the last nine players with Peter Harkes, finalist in Dublin, leading the way. He’s one of three Dutch players on the final table, alongside Ricardo Klaassen and chess-master Loek van Wely.

Maksim Martynov is our sole Latvian representative on the final table, he’s in second place at the moment, while we also have a couple of Lithuanian players still involved. The players are relatively deep-stacked so we’re suspecting this final table could take a little while, in the meantime enjoy the live stream as well as all the updates here on the blog!

Seat 1 Ricardo Klaassen NL 332,500
Seat 2 David Janssen BE 263,000
Seat 3 Arkadiusz Olszowy PL 494,000
Seat 4 Maksim Martynov LV 1,001,000
Seat 5 Peter Harkes NL 1,720,500
Seat 6 Vytautas Milvydas LT 286,500
Seat 7 Loek van Wely NL 804,500
Seat 8 Jarkko Mammela FI 747,000
Seat 9 Rytis Grunovas LT 615,000

Payouts (in LVL)
1. 62,829
2. 42,705
3. 29,187
4. 21,506
5. 16,898
6. 13,211
7. 10,753
8. 9,524
9. 8,295

So that, as they say, is that. Our final table of nine is all set to go, and it looks like it’s going to be a good one. As is usual at Unibet Opens, it’s an international affair – three Dutchies (always heavily represented at UO final tables), two Lithuanians, and one each from Belgium, Poland, Finland and the host country Latvia.

Chip leader by a long way is the Netherlands’ Peter Harkes, making his second consecutive final table this season – a feat only matched by his fellow countryman Pim van Riet, who incidentally seems to have been knocked off the top spot for the Leaderboard tonight by a third Dutchman, Tim Verbon. Go Nederlands. Harkes had a storming run in the last half hour of play, knocking out two players in quick succession, and goes into tomorrow on 1,720,500. His nearest rival Maksim Martynov is the only other player to have broken the magical million mark, and that only barely – he goes into Day 3 on 1,001,000.

Play is due to resume at 2pm Latvian time (CET+1) and as well as this lovely blog the live stream will be up and running all day, as will the various delightful live betting opportunities on the Unibet Sportsbook. And if you really have to step away from your computer, never fear – just visit m.unibet.com on your smartphone and you’ll be right here with us.

We understand that there is a party to go to, so we’re signing off now. All you at home – get some rest. You don’t want to miss this.

We’re not totally sure how the action happened but we believe Pim van Wieringen three-bet shoved for 228,000 from the blinds over a button raise from Peter Harkes. His fellow Dutchman called faster than a speeding cobra and van Wieringen knew he was in a lot of trouble.

Harkes:
van Wieringen: (oops)

The flop actually gave van Wieringen a few outs coming and there were a few shouts for a five from some of his friends, but the turn and changed nothing and van Wieringen will be our final table bubble boy.

Seat draw and chip counts to follow.

Giorgio La Iacona shoved for 223,000 and again it was Peter Harkes who made the call. On their backs…

La Iacona:
Harkes:

Board:

Harkes busts another player, and looks set to make his second consecutive Unibet Open final. La Iacona meanwhile is out in 11th place.

Denis Vasilev shoved for his last 107,000 and after a bit of a pause he got a call from Peter Harkes.

Vasilev:
Harkes:

Board:

Vasilev thus has to settle for 12th place and 5,222 LVL; so close and yet so far.

Maksim Martynov raised to 35,000 from the button and Cluas Uhrskov quickly moved all in from the big blind, instant call.

Uhrskov:
Martynov:

The board ran out and we lost our colourful Dane.

Loek van Wely opened to 32,000 on the feature table before Peter Harkes made it 85,000 next to him. Van Wely shoved and Harkes made the call for what was close to a 1 million chip pot.

Van Wely:
Harkes:

It was  a coinflip but perhaps not the sort we were expecting from the two big stacks.

The board was and Harkes doubled to about a million in chips, van Wely dropped to 770,000.

Meanwhile on the outer table, Jarko Mammela doubled up Arkadiusz Olszowy with losing out to on a board.

We’ve seen few fireworks at the the outer table recently, although the lack of action is not for want of trying – the players seem to be taking it in turns to go all in and pick up the blinds. Serial offenders include Pim van Wieringen, Arkadiusz Olszowy and David Janssen. They can’t carry on just nicking the now very large blinds (8k/16k/1.5k) forever though, and we’re likely to see an end to Day 2 this level or next.

It has to end soon – the Players’ Party starts at midnight…