Bansal Leads HK$103,000 High Roller, 8 Remain
Raghav Bansal holds the lead in the HK$103,000 High Roller Single Re-Entry Shot Clock, with high stakes specialists Nick Petrangelo and Dan Smith also still in contention.
Just eight remain with all players guaranteed at a payday of at least HK$470,000 (~US$57,536), although it is the HK$3,870,000 (~US$503,100) first prize that all will have their eye on.
Bansal powered into pole position midway through Day 2, after making a full house against 2017 Global Poker Index Player of the Year David Peters shortly after the second break, with Peters departing shortly afterward at the hands of Russia’s Sergey Lebedev.
While Dan Smith enjoyed a stint as top dog when play paused for the 60-minute dinner break Bansal did not drop out of the top three. A late run of hands saw the Indian player edge back in front shortly after the field was whittled down to the last 16.
With the departure of China’s Shou Li in 16th place at the hands of Xiaoyang Luo it took just 18-minutes to reach the final nine with Adrian Attenborough, Yang Wang, Xiaoyang Luo, Manig Loeser, Michael Addamo and Ryan Yu all departing in quick succession.
Bansal eliminated Wang and Luo in the space of three hands to cement a lead he would not relinquish though it was Taiwan’s James Chen who was the last casualty of the day, running ace queen into the ace-king of Ben Lai to bring play to a close at 12:10am in the early hours of Saturday morning.
Final Table Seat Assignments:
| Seat | Player | Country | Chip Count | Big Blinds |
| 1 | Nick Petrangelo | USA | 1,450,000 | 72 |
| 2 | Raghav Bansal | India | 1,787,000 | 89 |
| 3 | Sergey Lebedev | Russia | 805,000 | 40 |
| 4 | Sosia Jiang | Australia | 536,000 | 26 |
| 5 | Dan Smith | USA | 1,238,000 | 62 |
| 6 | Troy Quenneville | Canada | 1,698,000 | 85 |
| 7 | Xixiang Luo | China | 490,000 | 24 |
| 8 | Ben Lai | Hong Kong | 990,000 | 49 |
Remaining Payouts:
| Place | Prize (HKD) | Prize (USD) |
| 1 | 3,870,000 | 503,100 |
| 2 | 2,610,000 | 339,300 |
| 3 | 1,800,000 | 234,000 |
| 4 | 1,465,000 | 190,450 |
| 5 | 1,170,000 | 152,100 |
| 6 | 895,000 | 116,350 |
| 7 | 652,000 | 84,760 |
| 8 | 470,000 | 61,100 |
Day 2 began with 3 last-minute registrations to bring the total number of unique entries up to 180. With 42 players choosing to re-enter this ballooned the prize pool to an impressive HK$17,460,000 (~US$2,247,413).
In total 78 players successfully circumnavigated the Day 1 tournament minefield and with late arrivals and re-entries this saw 84 players left in contention to battle it out for the title and the trophy.
The action was fast and furious with over half of the remaining field departing before the second break with Steve O’Dwyer, John Juanda, Tom Alner and HK$206,000 Single Re-Entry Shot Clock Champion Quan Zhou just some of the notables who were unsuccessful in their quest to make the money spots.
Out of these, it was Juanda who came the closest, narrowly missing out after getting the last of his chips in with eight-nine suited against the ace-queen of James Chen and failing to hit the flop to take play hand-for-hand as the bubble approached.
Hand-for-hand lasted only a single hand with the unfortunate Zdravko Duvnjak getting his last 23,000 (just over 4 big blinds) in with king-ten offsuit and running into Sosia Jiang’s king-jack suited. Jiang paired her jack on the flop and despite turning a pair and backdoor flush draw Duvnjak missed the river to depart empty handed.
Notables to make the money but not the last 16 included WSOP bracelet holder Martin Kozlov, PokerStars Team Pro Felipe Ramos and High Roller regular Daniel Dvoress. You can see a full list of payouts under the tab at the top of the page.
Play resumes at 12:30pm local time on Saturday 9 April with the PokerStars Macau Championship Main Event Final Table also playing out at 12pm local time so join us then for the exciting conclusion to this spectacular poker series.
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and the kicker played a crucial role, eliminating Chen in 9th place for HK$390,000 (~$50,700). That concludes Day 2, as the remaining eight players will now bag up and come back tomorrow at 12.30 p.m. local time. There are 45:36 left on the clock for level 20 when the action resumes and the chip counts and a recap of today's action will follow soon.
, Petrangelo checked and Addamo bet 33,000 with around 170,000 behind. Petrangelo moved all in and the Aussie called it off.
turn and 
river saw the next player join the rail only minutes after the elimination of Manig Loeser. Addamo picked up a payday of HK$330,000 (~$42,900) for his efforts and there were just 10 players remaining on two tables.
on the turn completed a straight for Quenneville. Loeser needed a queen and a queen only to chop, but the 
river bricked to eliminate the German in 12th place for HK$288,000 (~$37,440).
to give Bansal a straight draw to go with his pair and while Luo briefly took the lead when the 
river gave the Indian player the straight and he busted another. Talk about catching hands at the right time. Luo headed for the cash desk to collect the equivalent of US$ 37,440 and Bansal stacked up to over 1.9 million.
