WHAT BEGAN AS an afternoon full of promise ended in disappointment for Eoghan O’Dea at the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas yesterday.
The 26-year-old from Dalkey was eliminated from the final table of this year’s Main Event in sixth place, but still collected a cool $1.7m (€1.2m) in prize money for his troubles.
And although a top-six finish out of a field of 6,865 players is not to be sniffed at, O’Dea will know that but for a couple of bad breaks, yesterday could have ended very differently.
At the start of July, the Dubliner blitzed his way through the event’s initial 13 days, qualifying for the final table (or the “November Nine”) with the second-highest amount of chips.
But he quickly found himself on the back foot at the Rio All Suite Hotel and Casino yesterday, handing over a massive chunk of his stack to German Pius Heinz after a failed bluff early in the day.
O’Dea drew himself back into contention with some steady play, but a bad beat against the all-in Ben Lamb cost him most of his remaining chips and he crashed out shortly afterwards.
O’Dea’s sixth-place finish equals that of his father, Donnacha, in the 1983 Main Event.
This year’s final table resumes in Vegas tomorrow evening with three players remaining. With over 100 million in chips, Heinz has a commanding lead over Martin Staszko and Lamb.
A top prize of over $8.7m (€6.4m) awaits the winner.
Great goal.. Watching Jeff on soccer Saturday was brilliant also when it looked like hartlepool were safe..
Saw O’Brien playing for derby when he was 18-19. The derby fans were way more excited about him at the time than Hendrick, Hughes etc that had also broken into the team. I remember our taxi man to the match in particular raving about him……
Real pity the injuries stopped that momentum, but great he’s still making a career out of it and plenty of time to kick on
Went over too easy during the celebration. Could of been a yellow for a dive.
What a goal great to see how much it means to the players too
Have to feel sorry for jeff
Read about him.in an article in Irish Times when he broke into Derby team ,watched him and was very impressed .
Hes been injury prone ever since ,hopefully this will be a turning point and he has a prosperous career after all.