Day Four play at the European Poker Tour stop at the Club Hotel Casino Loutraki, Greece, has come to a close with a host of German and Greek players in pursuit of a lone Brit.
Coming into Day Four play, Greece’s Charalampos Kapernopoulos was at the head of the 38 players remaining in the event with 892,500 in chips. After a less than stellar performance in Day Two – by his own admission over Twitter – former EPT champion Rupert Elder was able to leap into the Top Five on Day Three, sitting in third place with his 497,500 chips. Other notables who made it into the money included Day Two chip leader Toni Judet and Jude Ainsworth.
Eliminations came quickly on Saturday as players looked to “double up or go home” in the early going. Ainsworth found a spot to push a pocket pair of Jacks, but was trumped by David Elyashar’s pocket Queens to eliminate the Irishman in 31st place (€7000). Meanwhile, Judet and Elder continued a slow march deep into the tournament, while Kapernopoulos broke the one million chip mark to maintain the lead.
Down to 21 players, Kapernopoulos was the only player over one million chips (1.256 million) while Florian Schleps (907K) and Hauke Heseding (853K) held down the next two slots. As the tournament moved into Level 21 (6K/12K, 1K ante), one of the two remaining recognizable names would drop from the event.
After a raise from Kapernopoulos and a call from Andras Kovacs, Judet decided to make a stand with almost 250,000 in chips, moving all in. Although Kapernopoulos decided to let his hand go, Kovacs called and tabled a pocket pair of tens against Judet’s A-J. Once the board ran blank for Judet, he was bounced from the tournament in 21st place (€8700). Kovacs, who had been as low as 11K in chips on Day Three, suddenly found himself among the leaders with 700K in chips.
Once the tournament was down to two tables, Elder was in position to take a shot at becoming the first player to ever win two EPT Main Events. Sitting in the middle of the pack in ninth place, the German still had some work to do if he was to make the EPT Loutraki final table, however. The U. K.’s Zimnan Ziyard began to make his moves to the final table at this point. He vaulted over the one million chip mark in eliminating Koen De Visscher in eighteenth and steadily climbed up the leaderboard when there was a colossal confrontation.
After opening up the betting from the cutoff, Elder saw Ziyard three bet from the button. Once the blinds escaped the confrontation by folding, Elder moved all in for roughly 700,000 in chips. Ziyard carefully considered his options and, after some contemplation, made the call and tabled pocket Queens. Elder, with a suited K-J, was in big trouble and it got worse on a 10-4-10 flop. A Queen on the turn sealed Elder’s fate in thirteenth place (€12,100) and vaulted Ziyard into the pole position.
Over the next two hours, the remaining twelve men worked their way down to the eight handed EPT final table. The eliminations of Vasileios Chantzaras (twelfth), Georgios Grigoropoulos (eleventh) and Sergey Serafimov (tenth) brought the tournament down to nine handed play. Within fifteen minutes of the nine handed table being determined, Ziyard would knock out Elyashar in ninth place to end play for the day.
When the gentlemen return to the felt at the Club Hotel Casino Loutraki tomorrow, here’s how they will line up:
Seat 1: Ioannis Taramas (Greece), 1.755 million
Seat 2: Charalampos Kapernopoulos (Greece), 749,000
Seat 3: Pierre Mothes (Germany), 1.073 million
Seat 4: Hauke Heseding (Germany), 1.66 million
Seat 5: Florian Schleps (Austria), 850,000
Seat 6: Mario Puccini (Germany), 1.077 million
Seat 7: Andras Kovacs (Hungary), 210,000
Seat 8: Zimnan Ziyard (United Kingdom), 2.771 million
Although he has a nice lead at this time, Ziyard is by no means a lock to take this EPT championship. With the relative chip counts, anyone at the table can seize the lead with the right double up and, if it comes through Ziyard, damage his chances. Other than Kovacs, everyone is at or above 750K in chips – but remember that, earlier this month, few gave a seventh place stack in the hands of Pius Heinz a shot at the World Championship!
The latest champion on the European Poker Tour will be crowned tomorrow, with the winner walking off with a €347,000 payday.
