Into the last level of the day with two modes of play, both of which sway between speedy all or nothing poker - of double up or die - contrasted with the slower paced journey into the night, the warming sense of well being when you sit behind a stack healthy enough to breathe by itself on day two.

Team PokerStars Pro Noah Boeken could be said to have taken both paths, but as the half hour remaining mark came along he looked happy to take the latter approach. It had been an unsteady day.

“I was going good but I lost chips in a few pots.” He said. “I lost 15k on a hand where I thought he was bluffing. Then I went down to 5k, then 2k.”

Then the turnaround, almost breaking the sound barrier, going from 2k to 30k in about an hour.

“I doubled up, then doubled up then doubled up again. I hit some flops and it was easy. I had nines, the flop came 9-5-5. It’s not hard to win!”

At the close of play it’s a lot easier to sign off on your bagged-up chips when they’re worth counting.

***

On the table next to him is Phidias Georgiou. He’s spent much of this evening with his head low to the table, tiredness dulling his face and his forehead in his hand in a kind of ‘ice cream headache’ position. He was standing now though. Johnny Lodden has re-raised him on a board of K-3-Q-5-8., making a call a decision for all his chips. He does call, outdoing Lodden with his A-K to Lodden’s J-T. Phidias threw his cards face up on the table, following it with a curt “yes!”

He’s not going back to bridges just yet.