In a room full of Aussies, the Scandinavian accent of Soren Eriksen stands out dramatically. One of the few internationals in today's PokerStars.net ANZPT field, Eriksen is originally from Denmark but now resides in New Zealand.

Earlier this month, he won his adopted nation's national title when he took out the NZD $100k first prize in the 2009 New Zealand Poker Championships Main Event.

Eriksen's style matches that made famous by many of his countrymen - aggressive, relentless and successful. He's already built a stack above 35,000 and as the winner of the region's last major event, we wouldn't be surprised to see him again go deep here at Star City.

Speaking of travellers, the most relaxed man in the room is the sun-tanned and recently married Rob Galluzzo. The executive producer of Joe Hachem's new reality series The Poker Star, Galluzzo is back home (after an all-too-short honeymoon in Bali) to see the first contestant confirmed for the TV show via a single-table tournament here at Star City on Sunday.

Supported by PokerStars.net, The Poker Star will feature 11 Australians of different ages, from all walks of life, who will live together in a house in Melbourne, where they will be filmed around the clock. They'll take part in a series of poker games, challenges and eliminations - until one player is crowned The Poker Star.

The winner of The Poker Star will take home AUD $100,000. They will also live a poker players dream, playing in four of the biggest poker tournaments in the world with Hachem working with them as mentor and sounding board.

But let's hope Rob misses that audition, as it will mean he's poised to reach the final table of the ANZPT Sydney Main Event!

Already 12 of the 233 day 1A players have been KOed, and Andrew Scott could consider himself fortunate not to have joined them.

With five players seeing a flop of [as] [7s] [8s], Saidal Wardak bet 500, Bill Jordanou made it 1700 and Scott popped it to 4000.

Wardak, who won the $1500 NLHE Feature Event at the 2009 Aussie Millions, wasted no time getting his chips into the middle. Jordanou folded, as did an agonised Scott.

He showed [4s] [5s] for a flopped flush, but it proved an astute fold as Wardak was holding [10s] [9s]. "Imagine if I'd called and hit the [6s]," Scott mused. He's down to 15k, but lives to fight another level, three that is, with the blinds up to 100/200.