Vit Blachut arrived on the EPT circuit last year making a decent run in a few events and grabbing some headlines for his resemblance to Harry Potter, his unusual way of stacking chips and his aggressive play. Blachut has been maintaining his stack more than anything today but he found a spot to get all his chips in preflop in a good spot.
Christophe Olivier Jonin was the man who responded to Blachut’s raise with an all-in and Blachut snapped him off. Jonin tabled and was crushed by the of Blachut. The river ran out and Blachut had some chips to start stacking.
After a player opened to 1,100 from the hijack seat and Michael "The Grinder" Mizrachi called from the cutoff seat, Kyrylo Kustov reraised from the small blind to 4,500. The original raiser folded, then Mizrachi called to see the flop come down . Kustov checked, and Mizrachi checked.
The turn was the , and Kustov bet 5,000. Mizrachi called, and the completed the board on the river. Both players checked, and the hands were revealed.
Kustov showed the , but it was Mizrachi's that was the winning hand.
Adolfo Balado from Spain is one of the older players in the tournament today and from what we have seen of him he is not afraid to call light if he think his opponents are trying to push him around. He faced off in a pot against Russian EPT regular Dmitry Yurasov with the final board reading .
Balado was in the big blind and checked it to Yurasov who languidly bet 4,500 and remained expressionless, his heavy lidded eyes giving nothing away but perhaps provoking some suspicion from Baldo who weighed it up and made the call.
Yurasov showed him the and Balado motioned to muck his cards before deciding to show the table his hand.
Just before the last break, Toby Lewis saw his stack drop into the danger level. Lewis had opened to 1,200 on the buton before Ana Marquez made it 3,400 in the small blind.
Lewis made the call to see the flop, Marquez bet 3,000 and Lewis called. The turn was the and both players checked. On the river, Marquez moved all in and the former EPT Vilamoura champion was forced to tank for several minutes before folding what he said was a full house.
Olof Haglund sat deep in thought for nearly five minutes. He was in the big blind and had reached the river of a board reading . Having checked it over to his opponent Dominik Nitsche he now faced a pot-sized bet of 13,000.
The table sat quietly as Haglund mulled it over before eventually making the call and waiting for Nitsche to reveal his hand . Haglund had made the right call and his scooped the chips.
Kevin Vandersmissen opened to 1,100, and Mikhail Korotkikh three bet to 3,500. Vandersmissen made the call, and checked on . Korotkikh jammed all in, asking 21,000 more from Vandersmissen. The Belgian player made the call holding tens, and needed to look for a third as Korotkikh showed .
The hit the turn, and the river brought the to the table.
Korotkikh yelled something in Russian, and the entire room, but Vandersmissen, bursted out in laughing.
Jean-Noel Thorel, who played the Super High Roller earlier this week and finished third in the €10,000 High Roller here last year, just lost a bunch of chips.
He committed about 13,000 of his chips before the flop, calling his opponents shove with . He had to improve as he was up against .
The board didn't do anything for anyone, and Thorel has to continue much shorter.
Ana Marquez was in the big blind and called an early position raise of 1,000. It went heads-up to a flop of and the PokerStars Player from Spain check-called a bet of 1,600.
The turn card was the and this time a bet of 3,000 persuaded Marquez to throw her hand away.
Marquez may have lost that skirmish but it looks like she has won plenty of battles so far today in this long war.