Cliffhanger Ending as Second EPT Paris €25,000 NL Hold'em Tournament Sees Three Advance
It was a busy day at Le Palais des Congrès in Paris. The second €25,000 NL Hold’em tournament of the 2024 PokerStars European Poker Tour (EPT) Paris attracted a respectable field of 62 entries. They battled until deep in the Parisian night but after 14 hours of play, play was paused with three contestants left to continue the next day.
The tournament was planned to only last one day, but with such a big turnout that proved to be impossible. When the trio bagged at the end of the night, Tamas Adamszki had the most chips in his stack, bringing 2,765,000 chips back into Day 2, good for 28 big blinds. Online phenom Niklas “Lena900” Astedt is also still in contention to secure another PokerStars trophy with 2,180,000 chips, while Daniel Dvoress, who also cashed in the first €25,000 NL Hold ‘em tournament of EPT Paris, bagged the shortest stack with 1,255,000 chips.
Five others have already received a piece of the prize pool. Mike Watson, like Dvoress, also cashed in back-to-back €25,000 buy-in tournaments, while the likes of Joris Ruijs and Enrico Camosci also saw a return on their hefty investment. Meanwhile, the returning three are assured of €211,400, with €444,840 waiting for the eventual champion.
End of Day 1 Results
| Rank | Player | Country | Chip Count | Big Blinds | Prize |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tamas Adamszki | Hungary | 2,765,000 | 28 | |
| 2 | Niklas Astedt | Sweden | 2,180,000 | 22 | |
| 3 | Daniel Dvoress | Canada | 1,255,000 | 13 | |
| 4 | Johannes Straver | Netherlands | €160,400 | ||
| 5 | Mike Watson | Canada | €124,000 | ||
| 6 | Joris Ruijs | Netherlands | €94,800 | ||
| 7 | Enrico Camosci | Italy | €72,900 | ||
| 8 | Viacheslav Buldygin | Russia | €58,300 |
Day 1 Action
The day started with a modest 16 players on the clock, but that count grew steadily throughout the day, eventually setting the massive prize pool of €1,458,240 in stone when late registration closed after the dinner break. However, players such as PokerStars Ambassador Sam Grafton, Juan Pardo, and Sirzat Hissou would not make it that far as they all fired two unsuccessful bullets early on.
Adrian Mateos, Jesse Lonis, and Sam Greenwood all knew deep runs in the previous €25,000 buy-in tournament at EPT Paris, but bowed out soon after dinner this time around. Thomas Boivin met his end at the final two tables, and so did Stephen Chidwick, who failed to defend his title from the day before. Eventually, Chris Brewer finished in tenth place as the tournament reached a final table of nine players, of which eight would get paid.
Santhosh Suvarna was soon left with crumbs after doubling up Watson and was nearly forced all in from the big blind not much later. He met his demise while Adamszki won a big side pot with a set of jacks to take over the chip lead. Viacheslav Buldygin was then the first person headed to the payout desk to collect his min-cash of €58,300 when his king-ten could not beat the king-queen of Johannes Straver.
Camosci was next to go when he shoved his king-jack into the pocket queens of Astedt and failed to improve, while Ruijs was allowed one double-up before falling to Astedt as well but a few hands later. They went all in in the blinds, and although Ruijs turned a straight, Astedt rivered a full house to rake in the pot and tie for the chip lead with Admaszki.
Meanwhile, Watson had spent the majority of the final table short-stacked and finally fell in fifth place when Astedt’s inferior ace paired its kicker after a preflop all-in while Watson failed to do so in return. The final elimination of the night ended up being former chipleader Straver. He jammed all in over an open of Astedt but chose bad timing as Astedt immediately called his pocket nines and held against the ace-three of Straver.
The final three then played for another 40 minutes, where the chips flew around the table and the chip lead changed multiple times. Ultimately, however, Adamszki ended up with the most chips as the trio comes back tomorrow, February 18, to finish out the rest of the tournament. Blinds will restart at 50,000/100,000 with a 100,000 big blind ante.
Tune back in to PokerNews then to see who will capture the trophy and the humongous first-place prize, as well as all to follow the other tournaments going on in the French capital.