England Wins Party Poker Nations Cup

Team England, captained by Roland de Wolfe, won the third annual Party Poker Nations Cup, held this month in Wales.  England defeated Ireland heads-up and held off the United States, Germany, Holland, and Sweden, as well, to take home the $100,000 top prize. 

Germany entered the final table as the chip leader, having amassed the most points in the preliminary rounds.  England was tied for second with Holland, while Team USA was the short stack.  Right off the bat, Holland grabbed a huge number of chips from Germany, and Ireland subbed in most of its players in a short amount of time.  In fact, Ireland captain Padraig Parkinson only played one hand, deciding to have Donnacha O’Dea play as much as possible.   

O’Dea was the one who knocked out the USA in sixth place, spiking an Ace on the river to allow his A-K to best Chris Ferguson’s 9-9.  O’Dea then proceeded to cripple Sweden’s Anders Henriksson with T-T versus A-5, and Marcel Luske promptly knocked the Swedes out in fifth. 

Luske finished off another crippled opponent after England’s Neil Channing used 9-7 to beat Germany’s Thomas Bihl’s 5-5.  Luske, however, got a taste of his own medicine when his T-9 suited was no match for O’Dea’s A-K, and Holland was eliminated in third place. 

Channing, the recent Irish Open champ, was left to square off against O’Dea, the Irish poker legend.  It was a fairly close heads-up match until one pivotal hand.  With the blinds getting high, Channing pushed with 8-4 offsuit and was called by O’Dea, who held 2-2.  Channing nailed a 4 on the turn, crippling O’Dea.  Channing used a dominated T-9 versus T-3 a few hands later to sew up the victory for England. 

Team England featured Roland de Wolfe, Neil Channing, Surinder Sunar, Joe Beevers, Ian Frazer and PartyPoker.com VIP online qualifier Charlie Durbin.