Day 2 of the European Open Special Edition at the Wynn Las Vegas has come to a conclusion with Martin Soukup leading the final 17 players into the final day of play on Monday.
Sunday began with 119 all looking to reach an in-the-money paying top 98 spots. The action began intensely, and as tables broke at a furious rate, the tournament was quickly shifted to hand-for-hand bubble proceedings. Unfortunately for Michael Macey, he would become the tournament bubble boy when he called off what remained of his chips holding against Federico Butteroni's . Things never improved for Macey, and he would be out the door with nothing to show for his efforts but this hand in the blog.
From there, action would flow at an incredibly fast rate as the likes of Scott McMillan (93rd), Ting Ho (91st), Frank Rusnak (85th), Denaa David (79th), Andrew Mackenzie (77th), Ryan Laplante (72nd), Rauno Tahvonen (68th), Dan Murariu (67th), Kirk Morrison (59th), Katie Lindsay (58th), David Sklansky (56th), David Lappin (53rd), and Jimmy Tran (28th) all were eliminated.
Due to security concerns of players and staff following an incident on the Las Vegas Strip, play was paused for the night with 17 players remaining. Martin Soukup amassed the biggest chip stack of the day with 1,977,000 and he has direct position on his nearest two rivals in Hong Zhang (1,283,000) and Jordan Cristos (1,202,000). Day 1b chip leader Egi Adriaans sits in fourth overall with 1,055,000, while Yngve Steen is the only other player over a million as he has 1,025,000 in chips. Federico Butteroni (876,000), Rex Clinkscales (788,000) and Joe Serock (687,000) are also still in contention as all eyes will be on the $113,059 first prize.
Play is set to resume at 2:00 p.m. (PDT) with the PokerNews Live Reporting Team providing continuous live updates of all the action until the European Open Special Edition Champion is crowned.
The action passed round to Sean Chen in the cutoff, and he moved all in for roughly 140,000. Ryan Readenour pushed all in from the small blind for roughly 400,000, and Joris Springael called in the big blind having both players covered.
Chen:
Readenour:
Springael:
The dealer spread a board to see both Readenour and Springael turn a broadway straight to eliminate Chen in 23rd place.
Joris Springael opened to 35,000 in the hijack and both Jordan Cristos and Mark Hagendijk called from the cutoff and button respectively as Kenny Ho came along from the big blind.
The flop landed and Ho open-shoved his last 110,000 into the middle. Springael folded, but Cristos shoved for 1,450,000 and Hagendijk mucked.
Cristos:
Ho:
The turn and river landed the and , and Ho was eliminated in 26th place as Cristos climbed over 1.7 million in chips.
Regi Blinker opened with a raise on the feature table holding and was three-bet by Rex Clinkscales holding . Blinker committed the last of his chips, and Clinkscales called.
Blinker would need to improve, and when the dealer spread a flop, he took a huge lead in the hand.
Unfortunately for the retired Dutch footballer, the on the turn would shift the lead back to Clinkscales before the on the river would see Clinkscales river quads to eliminate Blinker in 27th place.
The action folded round to Nissar Quraishi in the small blind, and he shoved all in for 228,000. Joseph Wertz went into the tank for some time before making the call to put Quraishi at risk.
Quraishi:
Wertz:
The board ran out and Quraishi was eliminated in 32nd place while Wertz climbed to roughly 510,000 in chips.
Iwan Jones pushed all in from middle position for roughly 180,000 and Jordan Cristos called in the small bling. The action was then on Hyeongjin Kim in the big blind, and he moved all in for roughly 223,000. Cristos called the additional amount, and the cards were tabled.
Kim:
Jones:
Cristos:
The dealer spread a flop to give all three players backdoor chop outs, but when the turn landed the , it saw the advantage strongly shift into Cristos' favor.
Kim and Jones would either need to spike their own set or see a spade land on the river to remain in the tournament, but when the completed the board on the river, both Kim and Jones were eliminated.
The beautiful city of Bucharest will host a main event for the Unibet Open Poker Tour 2017 from November 30th to December 4th, 2017.
Players will stay at the luxury-grade Marriott hotel and will be treated to the famous Unibet hospitality, including welcome drinks, players’ party and lots of activities away from the poker table.
Last year, Traian Bostan defeated Eli Heath heads-up when his held true against Heath's on a final board of . Bostan collected the €100,000 first prize after topping the 603-player field as the final table payouts were as following:
against Federico Butteroni's 
. Things never improved for Macey, and he would be out the door with nothing to show for his efforts but this hand in the blog. 
flop left Wertz drawing extremely slim, and when the 
and 
landed on the turn and river, he was eliminated in 21st place.
board to see both Readenour and Springael turn a broadway straight to eliminate Chen in 23rd place.
and 
, and Ho was eliminated in 26th place as Cristos climbed over 1.7 million in chips.
. Blinker committed the last of his chips, and Clinkscales called.
flop, he took a huge lead in the hand.
on the turn would shift the lead back to Clinkscales before the 
.
landed on the river, Lee was eliminated in 29th place.
, it saw the advantage strongly shift into Cristos' favor.
on a final board of 