After starting the day with the shortest stack, Wong Kin Tung secured his second title of APT Incheon by winning the N8HK x APT Incheon final table. This victory comes off the back of his win in event #20 where he won KRW 2,907,000 for taking down the NL Single Draw Mixed event. The trip to Incheon has proved a profitable one so far, and he’s yet to enter the Main Event!
Let’s take a closer look at how Wong won this event.
Early Final Table Action
While Wong came into the final table with the shortest stack, the table was split evenly between the big stacks and the short stacks - Wong, Liu, and Kong all had sub 30bb stacks, while Tse, Chan, and Lam all had 40bb+ stacks. Wong got into an early confrontation with the chip leader; after opening A9o under the gun, he faced a shove from the chip leader who had AK. After some deliberation, he decided to fold and live to fight another day.
However, despite this early setback, Wong remained active and was one of the most aggressive players at the table. After picking off a bluff from the chip leader with K6 on a 64492 board, he moved himself up to 4th place in chips. Wong would continue to play a wide range of hands, calling Q5o in the small blind against the button raise from Liu Wing Po.
The J53 flop gave Wong a middle pair, and he checked/called a small bet from Liu. The T gave Liu a straight and flush draw, so he decided to bet 44,000 chips, leaving just 5K behind. Wong made the call again, and after the river bricked off, Wong led out for the remaining 5K chip, forcing Liu into the fold.
After some confusion due to an empty seat, a chip recount was done by the floor, and it appeared that Wong had far and away the biggest stack at the table, his 669,000 stack dwarfing the 253,000 of second place Chan Tsz Him.
First Eliminations
That hand left Liu with just one big blind. After playing one free hand, he woke up with 88 UTG and put in his last 5K chip. The newly discovered chip leader Wong put in the raise to 19K and everyone else folded, putting Liu in a great position to more than double up. However, four hearts on the board gave Wong a flush and saw Liu eliminated in 6th place.
Not long after that, we had our second elimination of the day, as Wai Kin Lam mistimed his shove and ran into the bigger hand of Tse Hing Lun. Lun raised from UTG with AJo and was called by Wong’s K5o on the Button. With 17bb remaining, Lam looked down at ATs and made the shove. Lun called after some deliberation, and Wong got out of the way.
The A92 flop was no help to Wai Kin Lam, but the 9 on the turn gave Lam some opportunities to chop. However, the 7 on the river eliminated Lam in 5th place for $250, which meant that the empty seat had laddered up two spots without doing a thing!
Wong’s Aggression
As the payjumps increased, the presence of an empty seat at the table was more keenly felt by the players, as the stack was closer and closer to getting blinded out, giving everyone a payjump. Wong took advantage of this and went on the offensive, playing extremely aggressively and winning a number of hands.
While it was a bit of a rollercoaster ride - going down to just over 450K after being up to 700K and back again, Wong showed why aggression was so valued in poker. By the time Kong Fung was blinded out, Wong had amassed a substantial chip lead, as his 620,000 stack was over 200,000 more than Tse Hing Lun.
Three-Handed Play
With the elimination of the absent Kong Fung in 4th place, the second- and third-place stacks had the freedom to open up their game, without fearing that they’d be eliminated before the empty stack blinded away. After a few hands, we started to see a gap open up between Tse Hing Lun in second place and Chan Tsz Him in third place.
However, that story got flipped on its head, as Chan shoved his last 14bb with KT over the raise from Tse Hing Lun. Tse made the call with his pair of eights, and the two would run it out. A ten on the flop gave Chan a huge lead, and neither the 4 nor the 7 on the turn and river could help Lun.
This put Chan comfortably second in chips, and Tse was now the player who needed to get something going. When Chan opened from the button, Tse shoved his last 8bb into the middle with QJ. The action folded back to Chan who made the call with A4, and suddenly Tse was all-in for his tournament life. The 826 flop gave Lun a flush draw to go with his two live cards, and the 9 on the turn sealed the double up.
However, the celebrations were short-lived, as the very next hand Tse got into a big confrontation with the chip leader Wong. Tse limp/called from the small blind with 86o against the K6o of Wong. The two saw a 652 rainbow flop which spelled danger for Tse.
He checked over to Wong who put out a c-bet of 32K into 66K. Tse shoved over the top of this bet, and Wong made the call after getting a count. The 2 on the turn presented some chop outs, but the 5 on the river meant that Tse Hing Lun was eliminated in 3rd place.
Heads-Up
This gave Wong an almost 5:1 chip lead going into heads-up play, and considering how well he had been running, it was hard to look past him for the title. However, Chan wasn’t going down without a fight, and it took nearly two hours for Wong to finish him off.
Chan even managed to take the chip lead at one point in the match, after flopping the top pair and holding on against the aggression of Wong to claim a 340K pot. However, a series of small pots gave Wong back his lead, and the two battled it out with even chip stacks for a few hands. However, after a while, Wong’s aggression started to shine through, and he picked up a series of pots to move clear of Chan.
It looked like Chan had to find another gear to get back into the match, but unfortunately for him, he picked the wrong time to do so. After raising with QJo from the Button, he faced a 3bet from Wong with QQ. Deciding that enough was enough, Chan shoved his 20bb stack, only to get snapped off by Wong’s dominating pair.
The 886 flop was little help to Chan, but the 3 on the turn gave Chan the chance at a flush. However, the A hit the river, sealing the win for Wong; he gets to take home another APT trophy and an extra $1,000 in prize money to go with his Main Event entry.
