Qui Nguyen and Gordon Vayo were the survivors as the World Series of Poker main event final table entered the heads up stage Tuesday evening Vegas time following the elimination of Cliff Josephy at third for $ 3,453,035 after just over an hour of play on the third day of final table action.
Josephy was the low stack among the final three players when they returned to the felt late Tuesday afternoon, and he had a roller-coaster of a game, doubling up on several occasions, only to lose it in big swings against two equally skilled opponents. Just before 7 pm local he was finally sent home by 27-year-old San Francisco pro Gordon Vayo.
It must have been disappointing for Josephy, a popular and highly experienced US professional player who had started the final table in the lead and was the favourite to win the prestigious event.
That left Vayo holding the lead (200,300,000) over Nguyen (136,300,000) with the honours and $8,005,310 awaiting the winner, and the two pros immediately set to work, providing the railbirds with plenty of interesting and at times exciting poker as the lead swung from one to the other.
When we went to press to press at 11.30pm Vegas time the two were still slugging it out, with Nguyen holding an almost 2 to 1 lead over Vayo (217,300,000 vs. 119,300,000).