Back in London getting ready for the PartyPoker.com Premier League Mixed Game Championship to start at the Playboy Club in London on Sunday. Being the playboy that I am I’m heading off to meet some Egyptian and Lebanese friends for a double apple shisha on the Edgware Road. I love the line-up, I will smoke them all! I just wish my good friend Joe Hachem was playing, I nearly choked on my smoke when I saw his tweet today:

‘@JosephHachem poker and chilling in Club 23 with boys from Kings of Leon. Haven’t been this relaxed in ages. Cool guys btw!’

Is he entering my twitter competition for impressions of a certain poker player? If so the $25 is on its way to you Joe – see you at the Aussie Millions!

Anyway to the NLH/PLH/PLO fest and the £2,000 cognacs at the Playboy Club. I think it is great that games other than NLH are going to get tv exposure – this is a positive step forward for poker. Here’s my take on the line-up for the $25k event.

• Luke Schwartz – still needs a trike and not a bike. I have taken all Bordy’s money – no harm in taking more!
• Mike Sexton – a legend, he’s got gamble but I am going to punish him for failing to secure the delivery of the wine pallets he ordered on our extensive tour of vineyards at WPT Slovakia.
• Max Pescatori – this Italian is going broke – he may not be a pirate anymore but I am. Avoid the horn of Africa Max. Bunga! Bunga!
• Matt Giannetti – he’s good but not as good as Martin Zasko. Hellmuth loves him too much, he talked about him every second in the live stream at WPT Malta. I’m not sure that’s a good thing Matt.
• Andrew Feldman – he used to be a paper boy – I gave him his break in tv poker. Don’t try and bum hunt me online at 4am in the morning Andrew.
• Andy Frankenberger – smart guy but you cannot run good forever – you know i was a forex trader once Andy?
• Ben Carpenter – no idea, supposed to be mouthy – he’s qualified? We’ll see.
• Yevgeniy Timoshenko – unlike Schwartz he’s progressed from a trike to a bike. Glory days over Timmy?
• Sorel Mizzi – is he cut from the top or bottom of the pack? He could do with the guiding hand of Tony G.
• James Dempsey – I remember him from Australia. He just needs to remember that I was pushing the organizers to pick Martin Zasko instead of him.
• Jennifer Tilly – she said in this clip why she is quitting poker. Like Hellmuth I think her more mainstream appeal is great for the game, whatever the purist might say. I don’t want to push her into retirement quicker than she anticipated but it will probably be unavoidable.

As to be expected, Schwartz accepted his invitation with great humility, dignity and respect.

Poker’s very own anti-social behaviour order said: “I can’t wait to get to Vegas and crush the field in the PartyPoker.com Premier League.

For sure there are some big names playing but I have to be a huge favourite. They need to know that I’m coming with my sharky hat on and it’s gonna be a whole week of soul owning from Full Flush.”

A PartyPoker.com spokesman said: “We did a lot of soul searching rather than soul owning before deciding to invite Luke into the Premier League. The fact is that he is a great player and he will certainly ignite the line-up and we haven’t even completed it yet!

It will be particularly interesting to see how he comes off in a verbal sparring battle against the Poker Brat himself, Phil Hellmuth.”

Full Flush joins Hellmuth, JC Tran, Yevgeniy Timoshenko and Roland De Wolfe in the line-up. Is this too much of a step up in class for the famous sandwich loving online high stakes sledger? We can only wait to find out!

Play got underway at 15:30 GMT, quite early for a final table but the schedule has had to be adapted to accommodate the new triple stacked format that gives players a whopping 300,000 starting chip count.  As with the previous heats the action was few and far between at the low level blinds.  But as the blinds began to increase the players were forced to start pushing the chips around.

With the combustible Luke Schwartz at the table Phil Laak and Andy Black were keen to tease the young londoner but Luke took it all in his stride determined not to let the experienced pros knock his concentration.  Schwartz was by far the most aggrerssive player at the table, consistently picking his spot to make pre-flop raises and slowly amass chips.

Online qualifier Jan Veit also made a strong showing in the early stages with his solid, tight style of play.  The most entertaining player at the table was Andy Black not happy with throwing digs at Luke he frequently made big bluffs against the unusually timid Jennifer Tilly as his chip stack vaulted up and down.

After the first break the play all of a sudden began to excite the large crowd that has descended on the Palm Beach Casino.  We saw all in after all in but the end result was chips being shared between the players as no one could deliver that crucial first knockout blow.  Andy Black had continued his cavalier style of play but after a few successes against Tilly his risky strategy began to count against him.

Soon he became the short stack, just waiting for the right moment to push all in.  With KJ in the hole Black made the move but Phil Laak looked down at A7 and that was enough to make the call.  The Ace hit on the flop and that was the end of the tournament for the former Main Event finalist.

Next to go was Mike Sexton, facing up to the inevitable all in as the short stack Mike pushed with eights only to be called be Jan Veit’s pair of kings.  It’s goodnight the the PartyPoker representative but it hasn’t been a completely bad day for the poker legend (more on that later).

Soon after tournament director called for the next break.  We are now five handed with Tilly, Laak, Bodo, Veit and Luke Schwartz left.  Nobody has yet staked a claim to be the dominant force at the table so it’s still anybody’s game.

Keep up to date with the latter stages of the tournament at our live feed on twitter.

Talking of funky buddhas, ‘Mad Monk’ Andy Black is also at the final table – joining Phil Laak, Jennifer Tilly, Austrian online qualifier Jan Veit and Luke ‘FullFlush’ Schwartz.

Organisers are hoping for no trouble when Schwartz turns up after he found himself barred from the casino when he arrived for his heat on Sunday.

It’s a great mix of personalities on the final table pitting very different styles against each other in the fight for the $250,000 top prize.  One thing to llok out for in particular isto see how Tilly and Laak approach the game.  Will they play as normal ignoring the fact that they are a couple or will they shy away from betting against each other in the early stages.

Obviously, we’re not suggesting there will be any collusion but it will create an interesting and highly unusual dynamic at the final table.  The other competitors will also be weighing up how to take advantage of the situation, can they distract the duo with their comments at the table or engender hands that force the two to play off against each other.

whatever happens we are in for a treat tonight, this is one of the most star studded final tables we have ever had at a PartyPoker tournament, and with the new triple stack format we’re guaranteed some great poker.

You can follow the final table action as it happens over at our live PartyPoker Twitter feed.

PartyPoker.com World Open V – The Final Table

Luke ‘FullFlush’ Schwartz

Jan Veit

Andy Black

Phil Laak

Jennifer Tilly

Mike Sexton

Bodo Sbrzesny

The online specialist outlasted an impressive field that included recent WPT winner Yevgeniy Tomashenko, PartyPoker pro Ian Frazer and WSOP Main Event finalist James Akenhead.

Luke was lucky to be even playing after his earlier altercation with the casino staff, see the previous post for more details.

Play got underway at midday with players sitting down with $300,000 worth of chips.  The new triple stacked structure proved to be a great success creating a very tactical, tense battle as the players used their deep stacks make creative plays.

Surprisingly, Luke found himself heads up against one of our two online qualifiers in this heat, German Christian Schaefer.  With equal stacks going into the heads-up finale it was anyone’s game to win but with much more experience at this level all of the smart money was behind Luke Schwartz to progress to Thursday’s final.
Play initially went against the form as Schaefer steadily built up a commanding lead leaving the tempestous Schwartz visibly frustrated.  With a lead of over 1.5 million chips it looked as if Schaefer was going to pull off a major upset but Schwartz began to fight back, picking up his play with aggressive pre-flop raises.

The game suddenly changed with one monstrous pot which gave Schwartz an almost insurmountable advantage.  The challengers went all-in after the flop, Schwartz had the top pair and Schaefer a straight draw.  The German failed to improve his hand on the turn and river as Schwartz’s pair of nines took the pot down.  It left Schaefer with barely enough chips to place the small blind and after a couple more hands Schwartz had finally won.

Earlier on in the day it had looked as if Yevgeniy Tomashenko would carry on his remarkable run of recent months as he dominated the first couple of hours but after a couple of bad beats he left the table in fourth place.  That left Schwartz up against our two qualifiers from Germany, Schaefer and Jorg Muller (Jorg had earlier knocked out both Ian Frazer and fellow pro Andy Ward in his first live tournament).

The two amateurs certainly didn’t show any nerves and looked right at home mixing it with the pros.  Unfortunately, we did not get to see the qualifiers battle it out head to head for the final place but Schaefer will go into the round robin heat  for the players finishing in second place.

Heat 2 has got swiftly underway as we go through the night and into tomorrow morning until we have a winner.  But you don’t have to wait for the latest news from the second heat, it all being covered over at our twitter feed.  Sign up and follow partypokernews to stay in the know.

At one point it looked like the casino, which is part of the Genting Stanley Group, were not going to concede and that a new player was going to have be parachuted in at the last minute. The casino made a special condition, however, that Schwartz had to have a special escort from the tournament organizers who is totally responsible for his behaviour.

An onlooker said: “They wouldn’t let FullFlush in and there wasn’t a sandwich in sight. We thought that only an individual casino group had banned him but it now seems to have come to light that he is banned from every casino in the United Kingdom. Schwartz went mental at reception which didn’t help matters.”

It now appears that ‘sandwichgate’ has led to a total ban from all casinos in the UK.

Anyone for a poker asbo?

We have a stellar line-up for for Heat 1 that includes Partypoker pro Ian Frazer, WSOP Main Event finalist James Akenhead, online phenomenon Luke ‘FullFlush1′ Schwartz and WPT and WSOPE winner Yevgeniy Timoshenko.  Battling it out with the pros are two amateurs, Christain Schafer and Jorg Muller, who have qualified through our World Open tourneys online at partypoker.com.

The action has been fast and furious in the early session with Yevgeniy taking an early chip lead but with the new deep stack structure allowing players more freedom to push their chips around things are bound to change.  As you might expect Luke Schwartz has been in a talkative mood on and off the table and has already got himself into a little bit of trouble, more on that a later!

Play will continue throughout the day at the Palm Beach Casino in Mayfair. We’ll have more updates as the game progresses and you can keep right up to date with the live action as it happens over at our twitter feed @partypokernews.