Pentakota Denies Sharma Fourth Poker Dream Title in Jeju Main Event

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May 18, 2026 4 min read

The Poker Dream Jeju 22 festival has come to a close, with India's Manoj Pentakota walking away as the Main Event champion, pocketing over $230,000 after a heads-up deal with Jeremy Chan of Malaysia.

The result is more than four times the size of Pentakota's previous largest cash, a Deltin Poker High Roller title in 2017 for just shy of $50,000.

The festival as a whole saw collective prize pools of close to $6,000,000, with other notable winners including GPI Player of the Year Punnat Punsri, as well as Winfred Yuand 2024 WSOP Paradise Main Event champion Yinan Zhou.

Poker Dream Jeju 22 Main Event Final Table Results

_{*denotes heads-up deal}

While Pentakota celebrated victory, the final table also spelled heartbreak for fellow countryman Nishant Sharma. The Poker Dream regular was chasing an unprecedented fourth Poker Dream Main Event title. Sharma put up a fierce fight, but fell just short in fourth place.

Following Sharma's exit, Pentakota capitalized on his momentum. He entered heads-up play against Jeremy Chan holding a commanding 3:1 chip lead and never looked back. The pair did agree to a heads-up deal, with Pentakota locking up the six-figure score — nine-figures in South Korean won!

In the final hand, Chan shoved with 10♥3♥ and was called by Pentakota with A♥2♥. The board came K♠K♣A♠6♠5♣ with Pentakota taking home the title.

Punsri Wins $20,000 NLH Superstar Challenge

Meanwhile, in the biggest buy-in event of the festival, there was a familiar face walking home with the title and prize money.

Punnat Punsri topped a field of 28 players in the $20,000 NLH Superstar Challenge to add another $200,000 to his career earnings, extending his lead at the top of Thailand's all-time money list.

This was Punsri's sixth score of over $200,000 this year, adding to a runner-up finish in the GGMillion$ at WSOP Europe, a Triton Main Event final table in Jeju in March and two High Roller results at EPT Paris.

$20,000 NLH Superstar Challenge Results

Full Event Results Poker Dream Jeju 22 Festival

There were a handful of titles apiece for Jieming Xu over the course of the Poker Dream Jeju festival. Xu grabbed ten cashes across the festival including his four wins. Having won the 3,000,000 KRW High Roller, he bagged other titles in the Win The Button, Short Deck, Knockout and All-In or Fold.

He wasn't the only one grabbing multiple titles. Alan Cho Fung Wong hadn't won a poker tournament since October 2024, but will need to buy another suitcase for his new trophies after bagging titles in No-Limit A-5/2-7 Single Draw, 5 Card Hi/Lo and two Turbo No-Limit Hold'em events.

Based in the United Kingdom, Will started working for PokerNews as a freelance live reporter in 2015 and joined the full-time staff in 2019. He now works as Managing Editor. He graduated from the University of Kent in 2017 with a B.A. in German. He also holds an NCTJ Diploma in Sports Journalism.

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• Tags Ganlin Lei Guofeng Wang Joe Brindle Manoj Pentakota Nishant Sharma Tsz Fung Chong Punnat Punsri