2011 PokerStars.com EPT Tallinn

Here are the final chip counts for day 1b

Day 1B of EPT Tallinn has come to an end with Oscar Lima bagging up 132,000 chips to claim the end of day and overall lead going into Day 2. The Spaniard is playing his first ever major live tournament and built up a 139,000 stack within the early levels and managed to keep hold of most of that throughout the rest of the day.

Today saw (as expected) a much larger number of players (190) descend on the Swiss Hotel, Tallinn. The hopes of all were to build a stack that might eventually see them crowned the first EPT champion of Season 8.

Those who came close to Lima included Jani Sointla (123,950), Anatolii Ozhenilok (108,125) and Sergy Pilugin (101,650). Notables who will be joining these players tomorrow are Team PokerStars Pros JP Kelly (52,450), Dario Minieri (34,625) and Ville Wahlbeck (32,675), along with Team PokerStars SportStar Fatima Moreira de Melo (58,325). Also worth noting are defending champion Kevin Stani (19,750), John Eames (56,300), Sami Kelopuro (38,525), Chris Brammer (35,750) and John O’Shea (26,575).

Today had a very different feel to yesterday. Caution was replaced with gamble and aggression. The fact that it took more than two levels to lose a player yesterday, compared to two players busting within thirty minutes today, tells you every thing you need to know.

Those who won’t be back from today include Toby Lewis, Michael Tureniec, Ivan Freitez, Per Linde and Team PokerStars Pro Sebastian Ruthenberg.

A total of 130 players made it trough, meaning the combined starting field for tomorrow is 198. They will be fighting it out for their share of the total prize pool of €1,071,600. All will be gunning for the first prize €275,000 and only 40 players will earn anything for their efforts.

Play resumes at 12 midday tomorrow when 75-minute levels come in to play and likely five or six of them. Until then it’s goodnight from us in Tallinn. We’re off to watch the very late sunset here in Northern Europe.

The clock was stopped with less than ten minutes remaining of the level and Juha Hellppi was asked to draw a random card between three and seven. He drew a six, meaning each table will play six more hands before play ends for today.

It appears that Britain's Chris Brammer has just been caught with his hand in the proverbial cookie jar as he mucked his hand without even seeing his opponent's hand.

Mikhail Shahnovitch opened the betting to 1,200 from the hijack, Brammer called on the button, John Eames called in the small blind and Janar Kiivramees also called in the big blind. The flop came down and everyone checked to Brammer who bet 2,650. This folded out Eames and Kiivramees but Shahnovitch called.

The turn brought the into play and Shahnovitch check-called Brammer's 5,100 bet and when the river came down the both players checked but Brammer mucked without showing.

The highly aggressive Sami Kelopuro has just picked up some much needed chips over on Table 5 to boost his stack to 22,000.

Kelopuro raised to 1,100 from middle position and both Matthew Ashton (cutoff) and Kirill Zapletin (button) made the call. The flop read and all three players checked their option to bet. The did not receive the same treatment as Kelopuro fired a bet of 2,625 into his opponents. It was enough as they both folded and left him to pick up the unwanted chips.

Jesus Lizano Cortes opened to 1,200 from the hi-jack and Team Pokerstars Pro Ville Wahlbeck three-bet from his position on the button. It was 1,900 more for the former EPT Barcelona runner-up who calmly removed his 1,200 and replaced it with a four-bet of 8,800. Wahlbeck with only 30,000 remaining decided to fold and get back to reading his book.

Mudassar Khan opened from early position with a raise of 1,300 and both Cortes and Wahlbeck called. The flop was and after two checks a 2,600 bet won the pot for Wahlbeck.

Jesus Cortes Lizano opened up to 1,200 from middle position and Krzysztof Rzeczykowski called on the button. A c-bet of 2,100 on a board of winning the pot for the Spaniard.

Chris Brammer has been put to the test on numerous occasions today, mostly from his fellow countryman John Eames. But just now it was Finland's Lari Sihvo that was asking him questions over on Table 3.

Brammer started things off with a raise to 1,100 from the hijack. The action folded to Sihvo in the big blind and he put in the extra chips to make the call. A flop reading was met with a check from Sihvo, a bet of 1,300 from Brammer and a quick call.

Another queen arrived on the turn, the and now instead of checking as he had done on the flop, Sihvo lead out for 3,100. Brammer was not going to let him buy this pot and he called. The dealer put out the out on the river and Sihvo quickly moved all in. Brammer removed his white headphones and asked for "a count please." The chips were counted out and Brammer was told it was 12,250 to call.

Calling and losing would mean Brammer would have dropped to 32,500, which would still be more than 60 big blinds, but Brammer continued to take his time in deciding what to do. A minute passed and he still had not acted. Thirty more seconds passed before Brammer did act, he folded.

Dario Minieri wasn't going to finish a day at an EPT by being pushed around and he proved that over the course of two hands (out of three).

He was in the small blind and then the cut-off when there was a raise and a call in front of him. We're not saying the Italian had nothing when he put in three-bets but when there's so many chips out there already, we had our suspicions.

Alexei Veselov was the flat caller in both hands and he'll feel like he's being pushed around now as both times he had to give up his holding. All those free chips has helped Minieri up to 60,000 chips.

Dario Minieri has just been pushed off another pot this time it was Runar Runarsson who is the man helping himself to the Italian's chips.

On a board reading Runarsson checked, Minieri wasted no time at all in betting 4,200 but very quickly folded when Runarsson check-raised all in for around 20,000 chips. When you play as loose and aggressive as Minieri does then I suppose you get used to people putting you under the maximumm amount of pressure.