Mervin Chan Wins 2013 Aussie Millions Main Event

If you want to win at the Aussie Millions, it takes skill, luck, and a lot of persistence. That’s what 2013 Aussie Millions Main Event winner Mervin “The Cat” Chan found out himself this weekend, as he battled through a field of 629 players – and one extra day of play – to win his first career major live tournament title.
After six days of play, Chan found himself at a final table that was rather balanced in terms of chip counts. Leader Dan Shak had 3,775,000 chips, but it wasn’t too far down from there to Joseph Cabret, who stood in 5th place with 2,655,000. Chan was in between those two, as were Patrik Antonius and Jarrod Glennon, making it clear that there would be plenty of battles to be had before anyone could take home the Aussie Millions championship.
Sure enough, the two short stacks at the seven-player table were quickly eliminated, and then the five players in the lead pack began knocking each other of. Jarrod Glennon was the first to go out in fifth place ($290,000), followed later by young pro Dan Shak, who took home $400,000 for his fourth place finish.
At that point, things slowed down a bit. Three-handed play stretched until 6 am in the morning, at which point the tournament directors agreed to give the remaining trio some much needed rest before allowing them to finish the tournament the next day. About ten hours later, Chan, Antonius and Cabret came back to the table to decide once and for all who would walk away with the 2013 Aussie Millions title.
Antonius was the first to be eliminated. He made a three-bet preflop shove and was called by Chan, who held pocket jacks. Antonius’ A4 was well behind and failed to catch up, doubling up Chan and leaving himself with very few chips. He was eliminated on the very next hand, taking home $600,000 for his third place finish.
That left Chan with the chip lead over Cabret in heads-up play. It only took a few hands to determine a champion, as Cabret shoved on the turn with a flush draw, only to see Chan show up with trips to hold a commanding lead. The flush didn’t come in for Cabret, eliminating him in second place (with a nice $1 million consolation prize), and handing the title to Chan.
Chan’s prize was $1.6 million – along with a Chrysler 300C – but the title could also potentially launch his career. Chan was a virtual unknown coming into the Aussie Millions series, but made a small cash in an earlier tournament before winning the Main Event. These were actually the first two cashes in his Hendon Mob Database profile, meaning that Chan almost literally came out of nowhere to win one of the most prestigious titles in the poker world.
With the World Series of Poker Asia-Pacific coming to Melbourne in a few months, it’s possible that Chan could come back to Australia to make more waves in the poker world very soon. If you’d like to join in on the fun, 888 Poker is still offering satellite tournaments for the WSOP Asia-Pacific, just as they did for the Aussie Millions.