button in SafariMuaaz Gani Leads $3,000 High Roller Into Day 2
One of the highlights on the schedule of the inaugural 2026 African Poker Championship in Tanzania is the $3,000 APC High Roller which has already smashed the $100,000 guarantee during yesterday's first tournament day with 56 entries, of which 26 players returned to their seats. The Prize Pool has already reached $141,120 and the action recommenced just after noon local time in the conference rooms on the ninth floor above Le Grande Casino in Dar Es Salaam with an average of 37 big blinds.
None other than Muaaz Gani is leading the way at the beginning and he is widely considered one of the up and coming live poker players in South Africa with $949,653 in recorded cashes according to The Hendon Mob prior to this stop. However, it is very likely he will cross the $1 million barrier as Gani took down the $5,000 Super High Roller in a field of 24 entries two days ago. Out of a prize pool of $100,800, Gani took home the top prize of $50,000 whereas Fedja from Germany finished in second place for $30,000.
Cliton Taliwanth earned a healthy min-cash of $20,800 after outlasting local player Muzamil Gothey on the money bubble. Other finalists included Costa Giannakopoulos, Thanos Vogiatzis, Praful Patwa, and Xu Yue, French player Raphael Bsiri bubbled the nine-handed final table.
Gani continued his dominance on Day 1 of the $3,000 High Roller to finish atop the leaderboard with four players increasing their 300,000 starting stack to seven figures. This also included Panayiotis Giannakopoulos, Sami Matar and Sheel Pattani while Costa Giannakopoulos narrowly missed out on it by a couple of big blinds.
$3,000 High Roller Top Chip Counts for Day 2:
| Rank | Player | Country | Chip Count | Big Blinds |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Muaaz Gani | South Africa | 1,476,000 | 185 |
| 2 | Panayiotis Giannakopoulos | Tanzania | 1,317,000 | 165 |
| 3 | Sami Matar | Lebanon | 1,132,000 | 142 |
| 4 | Sheel Pattani | Tanzania | 1,040,000 | 130 |
| 5 | Costa Giannakopoulos | Tanzania | 964,000 | 121 |
| 6 | Jaco Mouton | South Africa | 880,000 | 110 |
| 7 | Tome Dinh | Viet Nam | 873,000 | 109 |
| 8 | Dimitri Hadjipaschali | South Africa | 717,000 | 90 |
| 9 | Cliton Taliwanth | South Africa | 661,000 | 83 |
| 10 | Dan Zvonaru | Tanzania | 630,000 | 79 |
The action of the final day for this event can be followed on the Monster Jam Poker Tour (MJPT) YouTube channel right here.