Day 1b Wraps Up with 44 Players Advancing in Event #5: €550 NLH COLOSSUS; Ferraiuolo Near the Top of the Leaderboard
The opening flight of Event #5: €550 No-Limit Hold'em COLOSSUS has wrapped after nearly 11 hours and 18 levels were completed on Day 1b. A total of 427 entries were recorded with just 43 players advancing to Day 2. Merijn van Rooij bagged the chip lead by accumulating a healthy stack of 545,000 chips.
The Dutch poker player raced to the top of the leaderboard in the last level of the night, overcoming the likes of Pascal Foged (503,000), and Event #1: €350 NLH Opener champion Antonello Ferraiuolo (481,000). Van Rooij plays the majority of his live tournaments here at the King's Casino in Rozvadov but also managed to pick up a few World Series of Poker online cashes in this past year.
Ferraiuolo has had a great start to the 2021 WSOP Europe campaign by capturing his first-ever WSOP gold bracelet just a few days ago. The Italian racked up over €87,000 for his victory and has now put himself in the top three chip counts after Day 1b of the COLOSSUS. Rounding out the top five big stacks are Yizhaq Hay with 438,000 and Georgios Tsouloftas with 414,000 chips.
There were a few notables who failed to make it through the opening flight include bracelet winner Pete Chen, Roberto Manfredi, John Taramas, and Jan Bendik. The money bubble was reached in the second to last level of the night when Rokas Barzdzius got his last few big blinds in the middle with ace-king. Unfortunately for him, Tsouloftas flopped a straight with jack-ten and sent Barzdzius home outside of the money.
The final 65 players were each guaranteed €895 and a lot of the short stacks wasted no time getting their chips in the middle. Over 20 players were sent to the payout desk in the last level of the night and will have the chance to qualify in one of the later flights.
With the recent government announcements in the Czech Republic, there will only be four total flights for this event. Starting tomorrow, there will only be one flight per day with a 1,000 player cap, starting at 10 a.m. each day. Day 2 players will also be returning at 10 a.m. and playing down to a final table, which will then be carried out on Day 3.
Event #5: €550 NLH COLOSSUS Schedule
| DATE | DAY | START TIME (CET) | PLAY CONCLUDES | Total Entries | Advancing |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Thursday, November 25 | Day 1b | 12 p.m. | After Level 18 | 427 | 43 |
| Thursday, November 25 | Day 1c | 6 p.m. | After Level 18 | - | - |
| Friday, November 26 | Day 1d | 10 a.m. | After Level 18 | - | - |
| Saturday, November 27 | Day 1f | 10 a.m. | After Level 18 | - | - |
| Sunday, November 28 | Day 2 | 2 p.m. | 9 Players Remain | - | - |
| Monday, November 29 | Day 3 | 1 p.m. | End of Event |
For now, players may still enter the Day 1c flight with late registration still open for a couple of more levels. The PokerNews live reporting team will be here to cover all of the tournaments throughout the WSOP Europe so keep it locked here for all of the live updates.
. 
for a straight while Barzdzius was drawing slim with 
.
on the turn provided a bit of a sweat but the 
on the river sealed the fate for Barzdzius who was eliminated on the money bubble. The remaining players will now be guaranteed at least €895 with just over a level left in the day.
to give Alt a straight but he wasn't out of the woods yet as Aissaoui had a set of queens. The 
on the turn and the 
on the river failed to pair the board as Alt found himself a double up.
and Quint flopped a set of aces to take a stranglehold on the hand. The 
on the river bricked out as Quint score the double knockout.
with around 12,000 already in the middle. Riccardo Lacchinelli had the all in button in front of him with all of his chips pushed out.
completed the board and Boon was eliminated from the tournament after the first hand.
