It began as a classic matchup: Doyle Brunson vs. Annette Obrestad, Old vs. New, American vs. European, Prototypical tournament player vs. The successful online player….the descriptions go on.  And this matchup was so juicy that some people were more interested in the outcome of it than they were with what happened in the WSOPE Main Event itself. 

As I mentioned in my earlier post (seen here) I thought that Doyle Brunson would win the best of three No-Limit Hold’em matchup but I also thought that it would come right down to the end.  It turns out that I was wrong though as it didn’t come down to the end since Doyle won in two straight games.  But it was still close.

Brunson had to catch some cards late in hands to top Obrestad such as when they both went all-in during the first game where Brunson held a pair and Annette had a straight draw.  Obrestad hit a queen-high straight only to see Brunson overtake her hand on the river with a king-high straight.  The next game saw both players go all-in with a jack sitting amongst the flop.  Brunson held J-3 while Obrestad was sitting better with K-J.  However, the turn would give Brunson a 3 and a two-pair and the river brought Obrestad nothing better.

Brunson was the winner of the matchup 2 games to none but it was definitely a well played contest by both.  And it was fun too!  I hope that future poker events can drum up these kinds of contests to increase fan interest in the game of poker.  It might be nice to see something like Phil Ivey vs. Daniel Negreanu in a heads-up contest or anything similar in nature that would make the tournament events even more exciting.