At the end of the sky and the ocean
The host city for the Asia Nations Cup is Sanya, a place with plenty of history and tradition. Relatively remote from the centers of administration in China it was sometimes referred to as Tianya Hiajiao or “the end of the sky and the ocean”, a small tropical paradise now grown into a very popular vacation spot for Chinese and foreign tourists alike.
Players are still arriving to Sanya, but some have been here for days already – the organisers from China Poker Games and IFP have been setting up shop and preparing for this historic event to take place, making sure glitches are taken care of to secure a smooth start to today’s playing sessions.
The format and the points system will be like it was in Paphos, Cyprus for the European Nations Cup. Play will be 6-handed with everyone beginning each hand with an equal amount of chips. IFP’s Match Poker technology is in play utilising smartphones to deliver the hands and the computer software to track the entire hand history.
The Grand Fortune Bay Hotel is the proud sponsor and spectacular venue for this historic event. An impressive resort offering everything you could wish for in this beautiful tropical paradise in southern China. The hotel is sitting on the beach front alongside dozens of other mega resorts and luxury hotels stretching all the way to the main city Sanya on the southern end of the island.
The official reception has just taken place, presented by the always lovely Felicia Fields. The managing director of the Hainan Provincial Bureau of Culture and Sport, Mr. Liu Ping Jiu, gave everyone a warm welcome, followed up by marketing director David Sun of the Grand Fortune Bay Hotel while the opening event was rounded off by a presentation of the competing teams and a speech by IFP President Patrick Nally. The latter thanked all the sponsors of this historic event, adding an exciting piece of news – that IFP is now embracing more than 60 nations around the globe in its pursuit of a world-wide recognition of poker as a mind sport.
Here is the seat draw for the first session:
CPG is a team from China Poker Games competing for the Championship but not eligible to qualify.
Four national poker teams will qualify for the IFP Nations Cup Final. Plenty of fierce action and tight competition is expected to unfold over the weekend and we will do our utmost to keep you all in the loop with news, interviews, scoring updates and photos – welcome to IFP Asia Nations Cup in China!
Please stay tuned for updates on www.pokerfed.org.
For each session players will be competing over 30 hands followed by a break and another session of 30 hands. During the breaks teams will get a chance to discuss and strategize making the competition a real team effort.
You will notice that we display two scores, one for overall chip gain or loss and one for the team points won. The latter is the one which is determining the eventual ranking, but the chip count can come into play as a tie breaker.
As the scores have started to count and the tally has started to run on the monitors displayed throughout the playing area, the participants have started out quite concentrated. The scope of this grand championship is making an impact on most. One exception seems to be at Table 6 where Singapore’s Jacky Wang and India’s Sangeeth Mohan are chatting it up and spreading laughter around the felt. At table 3 Australia’s Queenie Kwan Yee Kim called a river bluff by Japan’s Tsuneaki Takeda and has likely added to a positive score for the Aussies.
While some of the participants may be unknown to the public, a good handful will be worth mentioning for their previous results in other poker events. We have already highlighted Julius Colman and David Borg – of the entire field the two of them have cashed for almost $1,5 million. From India Abhishek Goindi will remember a heads’up battle for almost $300,000 against China’s Nicky Jin, a fight he lost to the Chinese pro back in 2012 – and here they are now, competing for their nation’s pride and participation in the Nations Cup Final!
Hand 86, Table 1: