Patrik Antonius and Sean Winter were on hand to represent the poker establishment. Not that they were likely to have an easy time of it. Every other player at the final table was either a recognizable pro like Sosia Jiang or Punnat Punsri or a VIP with a history of playing high rollers. All of them had seven-figure Hendon Mob pages.

Hajiyev was a VIP, not a pro. Plus, he had gone nought for nine so far at the Triton Series Cyprus. It may have been a sharks-only final table, but Hajiyev was among a school of megs.

Boredom And Terror At The Final Table

The final table had a very slow start, with no eliminations or even much in the way of big pots for the first three hours.

Then finally, Ben Heath ran his A♠J♠ into Punsri’s A♣K♦ and hit the rail. Just a few hands later, the eventual runner-up, Duthweiler tripled up, taking a chunk out of Sean Winter’s stack and the entirety of Wai Yong’s.

This set the pattern for the table with hours of slow play, followed by eliminations separated by minutes.

By the time Jiang and Wai Kiat Lee were eliminated in seventh and sixth place, respectively. Hajiyev now had the biggest stack at the table and was up against four top pros, including Winter and Antonius.

Hajiyev’s mojo had momentum now, and within forty-five minutes, there was just one pro left. Duthweiler was already at a chip disadvantage with 8.1 million in chips to Hajiyev’s 17.7 million.

Duthweiler’s stack had shrunk to 5.6 million when—with blinds at 200k/400k with a 400k big blind ante—he picked up two red eights. Duthweiler limped from the button, allowing Hajiyev to move in with A♦K♥. Duthweiler called, and the dealer did her thing.

A king on the flop for Hajiyev was good enough for the title, and Duthweiler took second place and $3.6 million.

_{Lead photo courtesy Triton Poker via Twitter}