2015 partypoker World Poker Tour National London

The first starting day of the 2015 partypoker World Poker Tour National London £200 No-Limit Hold'em Accumulator drew a total of 193 entries. Once the bagging and tagging took place, just under have the field was gone with the screens showing 94 players left. WPT president Adam Pliska delivered the "shuffle up and deal" announcement at Aspers Casino in Stratford, and some notable names of the poker circuit had made it to the East End of London.

Lucio Pacifico and his stack of 104,000 finished Day 1a atop the pack, while Vasile Cosmin Stancu advanced with 93,700 thanks to cracking pocket aces in a crazy hand. Other big stacks include Erion Tota (92,000), Laurence Essa (81,200) and Jeraint Hazan (78,800).

Surinder Sunar advanced to Day 2 with 42,300 in chips, and James Akenhead busted towards the end of the first flight. Tamer Kamel bagged up 55,900 and will be returning with exactly that stack on Saturday to blinds of 600/1,200 and a running ante of 200, as the Brit cannot participate in any of the two remaining flights in this special accumulator event. Defending champion Gabriel Tuna advanced with 29,100, but he still has the opportunity to increase that amount in the two remaining starting flights on Friday.

WPT champions club member Tony Dunst has made the trip over to Europe and will play on Day 1b at 2 p.m. UK time Friday, as well as Day 1c at 8 p.m. Once again, eight 30-minute levels are scheduled and everyone can acquire further chips in the remaining two accumulator heats.

Day 1a saw 21 online qualifiers take their seats, and there are yet another 72 left to battle on the tables. The event's main sponsor, partypoker, provided a lounge with ping pong as well as free drinks pizza and hoodies, which was a treat for everyone involved.

The PokerNews team will be back just after lunch time on Friday for Day 1b and Day 1c, so make sure to tune back in and follow along what's happening at Aspers Casino.

Some of the bigger stacks may still be missing, the player with the most chips thus far has been Vasile Cosmin Stancu. James Akenhead appears to have busted in the last few hands of Day 1a.

Marc Jonathan Harrison was down to around 15,000 in chips and got them in preflop. Alexander Jager isolated successfully to get all other players out of the way and Harrison flipped over  . Jager had his opponent dominated with   and claimed the pot after a board of     .

"I have about 70,000 chips now, that is good right?", Alexandra O'Brien said after the last of four hands was played on her table. She had called a raise to 2,500 and Daniel Sormainis did so as well out of the blinds. On the    flop, O'Brien's bet of 5,000 would be enough to win the pot and she flashed the   after the preflop raiser had mucked his  .

Tamer Kamel knocked out a short stack with pocket kings versus pocket eights and then took care of two short stacks with pocket tens versus   and  . It is the only bullet that the Brit will be firing, as Kamel cannot play tomorrow when Day 1b and Day 1c take place.

The clock has been stopped with just under nine minutes on the last level of Day 1a and another four hands will be played.

Martin Kollmann put an opponent at risk after a raising war and saw the call of the opponent for his last 19,800 with  . Kollmann held   and had to ship over the chips after the board ran out     .

This time Paul Price didn't have a huge draw, rather bottom pair when the chips went in. He had raised to 2,300 and received two callers out of the blinds. On a flop of    the action folded to Price and he moved all in for 13,000. Laurence Taufik Essa called whereas the player in the big blind folded.

It was the   for Price and the   for Essa. Neither the turn nor the river changed anything and Price headed to the rail while finishing his beer.