Adrien Allain Bags Big Chip Lead With 28 Left in the Grand Final
French pro Adrien Allain finished with the lead over the final 28 players of the 2016 PokerStars and Monte-Carlo® Casino EPT Grand Final €5,300 Main Event with 3.9 million in chips. PokerStars team pro Vanessa Selbst remained still in the hunt for her first EPT title, but with 389,000 in chips she's one of the short stacks after Day 4.
Day 4 started with 74 players, all of whom were already in the money, and it was Fatima Moreira de Melo as the headliner, along with Thiago Nishijama, Randy Lew, Antoine Saout, and the aforementioned Selbst.
Allain has a strong track record with $1.6 million in career live tournament earnings and an APT Macau victory for $391,580, according to Hendon Mob, but he'll be trailed by some tough competition, such as Portuguese pro Joao Vieira. Vieira finished in second place with 2.7 million in chips and was followed by former EPT Player of the Year Jan Bendik with 2.4 million.
Three €10 Spin & Go qualifiers managed to make Day 5: Jan Bengelmann from Germany with 774,000, Luc Tu from Canada with 796,000, and Asan Umraov from Kazakhstan with 744,000.
The most fascinating storyline of Day 5 will be that of Thi Xoa Nguyen and Jimmy Guerrero, a loving couple from Paris. Nguyen had a top stack for most of the day and closed with 2.1 million, while her boyfriend ended the day with 1.2 million, which was also above the average. The couple's trip has already amounted to a guaranteed payday of nearly €50,000, but they have a chance at so much more and this is a story you'll want to keep your eyes on.
Other notables still in the hunt include Benjamin Pollak (1.118 million), Ariel Celestino (1.02 million), Roman Korenev (775,000), Dario Sammartino (581,000), Erwann Pecheux (553,000), and Paul-Francois Tedeschi (490,000).
Marcin Chmielewski started the day with the chip lead and 1.3 million, but things didn't turn out good for him. Chmielewski battled for most of the day, but got knocked out in the last level, collecting €19,760 for finishing in 32nd place.
Two former EPT champions, Joseph Mouawad and Aaron Gustavson, were eliminated in 68th and 35th places, respectively. Joining them were Nacho Barbero (65th - €14,11), Nicolas Cardyn (63rd - €14,110), Michel Abecassis (57th - €14,110), Nishijima (€16,830), Jason Gray (€16,830), Ivan Soshnikov (€16,830), Govert Metaal (46th - €16,830), Moreira de Melo (44th - €16,830, Ihar Soika (€19,760), and Lew (30th - €22,740).
Make sure to tune back in on Thursday for the penultimate day of the EPT Season 12 Grand Final, as PokerNews.com will bring you all the live updates in sync with the broadcast of the live stream.
While you wait for Day 5 to come around, check out the following video with Vieira talking about storming back to a big stack after nearly being eliminated.