The first tournament of the 2021 World Series of Poker Europe live series at King’s Casino is in the books. Antonello Ferraiuolo of Italy took it down and claimed the first bracelet at a live WSOP Europe event since 2019.
International players are turning out in force at King’s in Rozvadov, Czech Republic. It was the most reasonable way to play WSOP events this year without trekking all the way to America, which wasn’t even a realistic option prior to the border openings on November 8.
The first two events have already shown their prize pools to have surpassed their guarantees, something that the Las Vegas series had a tough time doing. One might say that the WSOP Europe is already a success, just four days into it.
Event 1: €300 NLHE Opener
The final day of the first event of this series started with 20 players in contention for this WSOPE bracelet. Symeon Alexandridis was the first player to depart on Monday, and Volodymyr Legkyi bubbled the final table of nine. That final table then began with Antonello Ferraiuolo on the shortest stack and Levent Efe leading the pack.
Ferraiuolo quietly began chipping up. Marius Gicovanu served up a setback by doubling through Ferraiuolo, but the Italian continued to climb, particularly so with a double-up through Narcis Nedelcu. And when Ferraiuolo eliminated Roberto Bizaj and Logi Laxdal in a single hand, he soared to the top of the leaderboard. The Italian took the bad end of several hands that followed, relegated to the shortest stack again…until he doubled through Efe twice and then through Nedelcu.
When Efe busted Ion Tabacaru in third place, he was only slightly behing Ferraiuolo going into heads-up play. It only took about a half hour, though, for Efe to get it all in with 10-9 with middle pair on the flop, but Ferraiuolo had pocket aces that held up for the win. He told PokerNews that it was a “special moment for Italy.”
Only 62 players returned to PLO action on Monday, and all of them made the money of at least €1,150. Previous bracelet winners Stoyan Madanzhiev and Sebastian Langrock busted early in the day, as did both of the starting flights’ chipleaders. Play moved along but seemed stuck at nine players for nearly two hours before Vlado Sevo busted in ninth place for €5,494.
Martin Kabrhel leads the final table but not by much. He is the only previous bracelet winner in the pack, though, having won two of them in his career thus far.
Event 2: Day 2 of 3
€550 buy-in
PLO 8-Max (Unlimited RE)
Total entries:
623
Registration still open?
no
Total prize pool:
€ 295,925
(€200K GTD)
Players paid:
62
Minimum payout:
€ 1,150
Winner payout:
€ 59,250
Chip leader:
Martin Kabrhel
Martin Kabrhel (Czech Republic) 3.9M
Players remaining:
8
Bjorn Verbakel (Netherlands) 3.725M
Day 2 restart:
6pm Tuesday
Zhao Feng (Singapore) 2.1M
Mikkel Plum (Denmark) 1.53M
Alfredo Vega Meister (Spain) 1.4M
Ken Beckers (Belgium) 1.335M
Tobias Peters (Netherlands) 835K
Richard Toth (Hungary) 745K
Event 3: €1,350 Mini Main Event
The Mini Main Event offers three starting flights this week, with all survivors connecting on Thursday. The first of those days brought in more than 300 entries to put more than €385K into the prize pool, more than halfway to the guarantee. The very long day played down to just 49 people bagging chips, which was about 15% of the starting field. Days 1B and 1C over the next two days will do the same thing.
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