Daily Rewind: NBC Heads-Up Semi Final, Aussie Millions Main Event, Blom Gambling

Daniel Cates, Phil Hellmuth and Mike Matusow are among the final eight in the NBC Heads-Up Championship. The Aussie Millions Main Event is about to start, and find out why Viktor Blom was late for his heads-up match.

The Daily Rewind is your one-stop-shop for a sharp review of the day in poker. Join us here for a mix of the latest news and a more irreverent insight into the poker world. Today we discovered the following topics for you:

NBC Heads-up Championship reaches semi finals

The NBC Heads-Up Championship is down to the quarter finals, and the Poker Brat is still in contention to take this event down for a second time.

Phil Hellmuth defeated David Sands to meet Eugene Katchalov in the Hearts semi final tonight.

Elsewhere John Hennigan defeated Phil Ivey to meet Mike Matusow in the Spades semi final. The Mouth beat Barry Greenstein to get there.

Daniel 'Junglemandan' Cates will face Scott Seiver and making up the last match is Brian Hastings and Joe Serock.

• Daniel Cates vs. Scott Seiver
• Mike Matusow vs. John Hennigan
• Eugene Katchalov vs. Phil Hellmuth
• Brian Hastings vs. Joe Serock

The way that the bracket works means that is very possible we could see a Matusow vs Hellmuth final, which would surely be the TV poker event of the year.

Click to enlarge

Aussie Millions Main Event and $100,000 Challenge start today

Defending champion Oliver Spiedel

Melbourne is about to see a major poker boost today, as both the $10,000 Aussie Millions Main Event and the $100,000 Challenge begin.

Technically they start tomorrow, but as they are around 12 hours ahead of those of us in Europe it really is starting very soon.

One change to the $100,000 Super High Roller event this year is that there are optional re-entries for anyone who busts out during the registration period. Quite how much demand there will be for six-figure re-entries remain to be seen.

We will be bringing daily recaps of both events from here on in, so stay tuned to PokerStrategy.com for all the latest chip counts.

ESPT Madrid sees record attendance

Poker is flourishing in Spain as the PokerStars ESPT Madrid has captured a record attendance for the €1,100 main event.

The previous record field was 498, but this year's event got underway this week with 632.

The event is nearing the money bubble, those of you who can speak Spanish can follow the event at the Spanish PokerStars Blog.

High Stakes Corner

Online Phenom Viktor Blom was late for one of his NBC Heads-up Championship matches this week, and there is no surprise that it was high stakes action which held him up.

In a video interview Barry Greenstein revealed that Blom had been playing an ultra high stakes game of Open Faced Chines Poker with Tom Dwan and Gus Hansen.

Greenstein didn't reveal how much they played for, but he did say that it was "in line with the Macau game".

been playing chinese poker with @tomdwan and @gushansen these past few days. i think i should learn how to play soon 🙂

— Viktor Blom (@ViktorBlom) January 22, 2013

Daily Signoff

To celebrate Phil Hellmuth's advancement in the NBC Heads-up Championship, we look back at this classic hand from the event five years ago against Tom Dwan: