Muhammad Asad takes down A$1,150 Opening Event at the Aussie Millions

Despite Asad winning the tournament, the biggest winner was runner-up Justin Pritchard.

"I focused on taking it one hand at a time, so I haven’t really thought about it too much."

The final day Opening Event at this year’s Aussie Millions started with 15 players remaining in the field. Then chip leader, Artur Koren was amongst the firsts to be busted, he left in 12th place, good for A$17,419.

Justin Pritchard became the chip leader by the time, the final table was reached and he was able to increase his lead thanks to eliminating 4 of his opponents. He busted Tou Ta Wei in 9th place (A$26,398) first. Day 2 chip leader Justin Bernstein was next to go, falling at the hands of Muhammed. Bernstein’s 8th place earned him A$31,785.

"I had a fair idea about the sort of game each player was going to bring," said Muhammed. "I just had to pick my spots carefully, make no mistakes and give myself the best chance in those spots."

Despite a successful double up Ning Zhang exited in 7th place, after losing his last chips to Pierce McKellar. Ning added A$37,173 to his bankroll. Pritchard still had a million-strong lead over Asad at this point and he even furthered the gap, after eliminating Kim Macnaught with a flopped set. Kim left the table in 6th place to pick up his hard-earned A$44,535.

McKellar lost with ace-queen against the pocket queens of Pritchard and had to settle for 5th place which worthed A$62,493 this time. Justin didn’t seem to stop, he busted Norway’s Didrik Manton in 4th place, cementing his lead. The Scandinavian took home A$93,920.

At this point, the three remaining players decided to take a look at the numbers for a possible deal, and they came to an agreement after some negotiation. According to the deal, Pritchard locked A$274,434, while Matt Edwards received A$219,472 and Asas A$206,002. The three returned to the table, to play for the A$14,908 and the ANTOL Championship Ring.

"Initially I didn’t really want to do a deal; I was feeling pretty confident," Asad later recalled. "But at the same time it’s easy to get cooler and there goes $70,000. We spoke about it for a while and it took a long time for us to get a deal done."

"I ended up getting a better offer than was initial on the numbers. And then I decided it was a smart idea to just take it."

The heads-up battle

It was Edwards who busted in third place after his king-eight lost to the pocket deuces of Asad’s. Despite flopping trips, Matt couldn’t avoid a bustout thanks to a two-outer on the river for Muhammed.

After taking down this pot, Asad found himself with the biggest chip stack, going into the heads-up, and eventually busted Pritchard, when he managed to hit a flush on the river against top pair.

Final results