After a brisk pace of eliminations in the first level brought the field down to just 2 tables, the pace has slowed dramatically, with only one bustout for the whole level. A notable bust it was, in the form of Mike Matusow. Mike moved all in on the flop and was called. At the time Matusow’s jack high was the best hand, but Johnny Lodden had a powerful draw with an open ended straight flush draw. A pair on the turn gave Lodden the lead with Matusow needing a non-spade ten or jack to win the pot and stay alive in the tournament. It didn’t happen and once again Matusow falls just a little short of a WSOP main event title.

Matusow’s (right) elimination from the secondary table leaves 17 players in the field. After a 20 minute break they will be back at the tables to play the 4k / 8k blind level with antes of 1k. The secondary table will be missing the mouth, but still has plenty of interesting characters with Brian “sbrugby” Townsend, Peter “#1Pen” Neff, Scott “emptyseat88″ Fischman, Johnny Lodden and Ivan Demidov all at the table. Neff had a card dead level, blinding off about 80k worth of chips and dropping to 250k.

Over at the feature table chip leader John Juanda continues to dominate the show and sucking the chips away from the rest of the players at the table.  Daniel Negreanu has dropped to 335k while Justin “Boosted J” Smith is down to 370k, with Soren Kongsgaard also in the low 300’s at the feature table and Brandon Adams is seriously short stacked at 145k.  Juanda’s pile of 1.25 million chips is the dominating force going into the third level of play for the day.

Chip Counts:
John Juanda - 1,280,000
Scott “emptyseat88″ Fischman - 460,000
Justin “Boosted J” Smith - 370,000
Daniel Negreanu - 335k
Soren Kongsgaard - 303k
Peter “#1Pen” Neff - 260k
Brian “sbrugby” Townsend - 150k

• October 1, 2008 -- Boosted Busted, Townsend Gone Too
• October 1, 2008 -- WSOPE Day 4, West Out Early
• September 30, 2008 -- Juanda, Negreanu, Boosted J Lead The Way into Day 4
• September 29, 2008 -- Finish Strong, Day 2 Complete

After Tim “Tmay420″ West was eliminated to start the day the rest of the first level of play saw a full handful of players join him. Andy Bloch was the next out, finishing in 23rd with Perttu Bergius and Mel Judah being the next to go. As the level wore on Andre Torsvik found himself yet another victim of a hot John Juanda who is distancing himself from the field.

Torsvik’s 20th place finish left the field one elimination away from being down to two players. It wasn’t long until the short stacked Erik Seidel became the 19th place finisher, earning £28,960 or the US equivalent of $51,560.

Eliminations were not the only story in the early going though. Justin “Boosted J” Smith took a hit when his pocket jacks lost a large pot to AT all in preflop, but he still finished the level with a solid 540k. The story of the level was John Juanda (left), doing the dirty work and eliminating player after player while adding to his stack which is now just over 1.1 million chips and nearly twice the second largest stack of 600k. Players who are no more thanks to Juanda include Andy Bloch, Mel Judah, and Andre Torsvik. At this pace Juanda will have the WSOPE down to the final table in a few more hours.

Peter “#1Pen” Neff gained a little ground in the first level, finishing with 333k, and uptick of about 50% from the 213k he started the day with.

The players are sticking around after the end of the level while the 500 chips are being colored up. Once the color up and break are complete the second level of play for the day will commence. Here are some chip counts from the final 18:

John Juanda - 1,110,000
Justin “Boosted J” Smith - 540,000
Daniel Negreanu - 450,000
Scott “emptyseat88″ Fischman - 340,000
Peter “#1Pen” Neff - 333,000
Soren Kongsgaard - 256,000
Brian “sbrugby” Townsend - 215,000
Mike Matusow - 211,000

Here are the payouts for the final 18 spots in British pounds:
1st £868,800
2nd £533,950
3rd £334,850
4th £271,500
5th £217,200
6th £171,950
7th £135,750
8th £108,600
9th £81,450
10th - 12th £54,300
13th - 15th £45,250
16th - 18th £36,200

• September 30, 2008 -- Juanda, Negreanu, Boosted J Lead The Way into Day 4
• October 1, 2008 -- Boosted Busted, Townsend Gone Too
• October 1, 2008 -- WSOPE Day 4, West Out Early
• September 29, 2008 -- Finish Strong, Day 2 Complete

The final 24 players are back at the tables for the playdown day at the World Series of Poker Europe, presented by Betfair. The TV crews are out in full force, hovering around all three tables to catch the action. The first big event of the day was the elimination of tournament short stack Tim “Tmay420″ West (right).

West came into the day with only 63,500 and his chips were quickly in the middle as Tim moved in on one of the first hands over the top of an opening raise. Peter “#1Pen” Neff called from the big blind and the initial bettor got out of the way leaving Tim heads up with Neff. Peter was way out in front with his pocket tens against West and his pocket threes. The tens help up eliminating West in 24th place for a payout of £28,960, equal to $51,542 in US dollars.

When the action started today 2 players were missing. Brian “sbrugby” Townsend came in a few hands late, mentioning that traffic was terrible. He is now seated at the main feature table after missing only a few hands. Justin “Boosted J” Smith was also a late arrival, but like Townsend slipped into his seat at the table before many hands had passed.

Pictured Left:  Both had the benefit of having a tournament official stack up their chips for them so once they were at the tables they could jump right in to focusing on playing.

TV crews have the access limited for all other media, but we will do our best to keep up with the situation and bring you as much information about the day as we can.

• September 30, 2008 -- Juanda, Negreanu, Boosted J Lead The Way into Day 4
• September 29, 2008 -- Finish Strong, Day 2 Complete
• October 1, 2008 -- Boosted Busted, Townsend Gone Too
• October 1, 2008 -- Slow Level, Matusow Falls Short

After another 5 full levels day 3 play is complete, with a mere 24 players left with chips. The last level of the day saw some action, excitement and big pots. Some standard, some leaving eyebrows raised and heads shaking. At the end of play John Juanda, Daniel Negreanu and Justin “Boosted J” Smith (below left) had the biggest piles in front of them and will lead the way starting day 4 play tomorrow.

Brian “sbrugby” Townsend came out on the good end of one of the head shakers. In a pot where Scott “emptyseat88″ Fischman was raised preflop by Townsend, and then Townsend was raised by Ivan Demidov things got whacky. Fischman decided to put in another raise, enough to commit him to the pot were either Townsend or Demidov willing to go all in.

Brian went into the tank for a long time before finally putting the rest of his chips in. Once Demidov passed it was back to Fischman who had to call the few more chips no matter his holding. He did, turning over the solid holding of T-2 offsuit. Townsend had one of the very few hands he could have in this spot with his pocket kings.

“I wasn’t trying to bluff you,” Fischman said after the hand. “I was trying to bluff him,” indicating Demidov. Townsend waking up with kings put a kink in Fischman’s plan and cost him 200k chips that ended up going to Townsend who finished the day with 424,500.

The top 3 all finished with over 600k, with John Juanda and his 657,500 just ahead of Negreanu’s 653,000. Smith is not far behind with 624,500. All three have had a lot of chips for most of the tournament and are playing really well with large stacks in front of them.

For Peter “#1Pen” Neff (right) his 213,500 is less than he would like to have, especially after spiking up to around 400k late in the day, but he is still in decent shape and has plenty of chips to work with relative to the blind levels for the first few levels tomorrow. The first level of play tomorrow will be at 2,500 / 5k with a 500 ante and the next level goes to 3k / 6k with a 1k ante.

While Neff has 42 big blinds to start the day Tim “Tmay420″ West is in a familiar spot. His 63,500 represents just over 12 big blinds. He has been hanging around with just over 10 big blinds for most of the tournament, his patience never waning. Tim will be looking for a quick start tomorrow to give him some room to work.

A full rundown of the players still in, their chip counts and tomorrows starting table and seat are listed below. Day 4 play will take the field down to the final 9.

• October 1, 2008 -- Boosted Busted, Townsend Gone Too
• September 29, 2008 -- Finish Strong, Day 2 Complete
• October 1, 2008 -- One Level, 6 Players Down
• October 1, 2008 -- WSOPE Day 4, West Out Early

With 38 players left the clock ran out on the 3rd level of the day sending the players to dinner break without quite reaching the money.  They now have the next two hours to ponder money bubble and mid end game strategy.  Peter “#1Pen” Neff saw some of his chip stack slide back over to Brain “sbrugby” Townsend (left) who has bounced back nicely from his previous setback.  Townsend was able to double through Peter, bringing his stack back to 200k while Neff dropped to under 250k.

Since the field was cut to only 5 remaining tables everyone has been moved out to the main floor where the feature table has been throughout.  With this consolidation there are now TV crews moving everywhere about the area, with other media being all but shut out for the time being. 

Justin “Boosted J” Smith has been impressive in a unique way.  He has managed to be at the top of the chip counts for pretty much the whole tournament, and he has done so without drawing much attention.  He isn’t flailing around in big pots and taking any coinflip he can find to get chips, he is just slowly pounding away at any and all weakness and taking what is available to him.  Often the most dangerous players are the ones you hear the least about, and Smith fits the bill for that so far in the World Series of Poker Europe.

After dinner play will continue for two more levels, or until only 18 players remain.  With the money bubble and hand for hand play still to come getting down to 18 is unlikely but the field will almost surely drop into the 20’s by days end.  Stay tuned for updates…

Here are the P5ers still in at this stage:
Justin “Boosted J” Smith
Chris “Moorman1″ Moorman
Peter “#1Pen” Neff
Brian “sbrugby” Townsend
Tim “Tmay420″ West
Scott “emptyseat88″ Fischman

• October 1, 2008 -- WSOPE Day 4, West Out Early
• September 30, 2008 -- Juanda, Negreanu, Boosted J Lead The Way into Day 4
• October 1, 2008 -- Boosted Busted, Townsend Gone Too
• October 1, 2008 -- Slow Level, Matusow Falls Short