Fausto Tantillo Bags Chip Lead as €880 Merit Poker Cup Reaches Final Table
Day 2 of the €880 Merit Poker Cup has wrapped up inside the Merit Royal Splendid Casino in Budva as part of the Merit Poker Montenegro Championship, and the final table is set. From a field of 415 entries, just nine players remain, all now guaranteed at least €5,790.
Italy’s Fausto Tantillo will lead the finalists into the last day after bagging 2,810,000, narrowly ahead of Mikhail Zavoloka with 2,625,000. Bojan Berberovic sits in third with 1,995,000, while the remaining stacks will have work to do as the title and the €61,000 top prize come into focus.
The final moments of the night produced a huge swing when Tantillo won a massive preflop confrontation against Berberovic, getting it in with ace-king against pocket tens and pairing his king on the flop to secure a pivotal pot that pushed him into the chip lead heading into the final table.
Final Table Chip Counts
| Rank | Player | Country | Chip Count | Big Blinds |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Fausto Tantillo | Italy | 2,810,000 | 141 |
| 2 | Mikhail Zavoloka | Russia | 2,625,000 | 131 |
| 3 | Bojan Berberovic | Montenegro | 1,995,000 | 100 |
| 4 | Rashad Iskandarov | Azerbaijan | 1,255,000 | 63 |
| 5 | Ali Moein | Iran | 1,080,000 | 54 |
| 6 | Vladimir Lappo | Belarus | 975,000 | 49 |
| 7 | Nikolay Fal | Russia | 580,000 | 29 |
| 8 | Genrik Alekian | Ukraine | 575,000 | 29 |
| 9 | Oleksii Shchukin | Ukraine | 565,000 | 28 |
Day 2 Action
Play began with a brisk tempo as the remaining players, already in the money, looked to build stacks with the pay jumps starting to matter. Very quickly, the field was trimmed down from the 61 that returned to the three-table redraw.
Early in the push toward the final two tables, Benjamin Nicault was eliminated in 15th place after getting his chips in from the big blind with king-queen and being unable to hold against the suited queen-jack of Charbel Daou, who paired up on the river to send the Day 1c chip leader to the rail.
Berberovic continued to build as the field thinned, first eliminating Elie Farah after calling off a shove on the turn and showing a jack for trips to leave Farah drawing dead. Not long after, Berberovic picked up another key knockout when Pablo Redrado ran his short stack into pocket sevens, helping Berberovic climb toward the top of the counts.
There was no shortage of big pots away from the all-ins, with Vladimir Lappo making a sharp call against Mikhail Zavoloka after check-calling a sizeable river bet on a paired board. Zavoloka tabled an airball, while Lappo showed trips to scoop a valuable pot.
Zavoloka would later land one of the biggest doubles of the day, getting it in with pocket aces against the ace-king of Genrik Alekian and holding through to surge up the counts. The swing left Alekian short, but he managed to hang around into the later stages and ultimately found a bag for the final table.
As the tournament neared the last two tables, Bobby James was eliminated in 14th place after finding himself all in for the last of his stack against Lappo. James needed help on the river, but it didn’t arrive, ending his run after a difficult, card-dead stretch.
The run to the final table accelerated from there. Stefan Cupic exited in 13th place after getting it in with pocket sixes and falling to the ace-jack of Ali Moein, while Christoforos Chrysochoidis was soon eliminated after calling off his remaining chips and being shown a straight by Zavoloka.
The final table was confirmed after a quick burst of eliminations, with Daou falling in 11th when his pocket fives were outdrawn by Berberovic, before Erdal Gulseven was eliminated in 10th after flopping top pair but running into Zavoloka’s set of tens.
Remaining Payouts
| Place | Prize (EUR) |
|---|---|
| 1 | €61,000 |
| 2 | €42,500 |
| 3 | €29,000 |
| 4 | €20,000 |
| 5 | €15,000 |
| 6 | €12,000 |
| 7 | €9,500 |
| 8 | €7,400 |
| 9 | €5,790 |
Play resumes at 1:00 p.m. local time on Sunday, January 18, with the remaining nine players returning to battle for the €880 Merit Poker Cup title and the €61,000 top prize.
PokerNews will be on the floor for the final day, bringing you live updates and chip counts as a champion is crowned in Budva.