Alexandru Papazian had kept his shorter stack afloat with some jams and surpassed more than half of the average. Some of those chips then vanished when he raised and Manuel Bueno defended the big blind.
Bueno check-called two bets worth two-thirds of the pot on the flop and turn. The river was checked by both and Bueno tabled the as the winning hand.
"You are running too good, I am just happy to still be in," Papazian said with a smile on the face.
Alexander Norden was all in from early position and Majid Ejlal Noubarian committed the rest of his small stack from the next seat over. Said Chegdane looked down and called both players with more from the small blind and action was three ways with Norden and Noubarian at risk.
Alexander Norden:
Majid Ejlal Noubarian:
Said Chegdane:
The board ran out and Chegdane made quad aces to knock out both players and move above 150,000.
On table 22, three players saw a flop of . Roland Rokita was the first to act and checked to Robert Cowen who bet 2,500. Max Neugebauer called, from the seat to Cowens's left, as did Rokita.
The turn came and Rokita checked again. Cowen, this time, elected to check and Neugebauer bet 15,000. Cowen called and the two went to the river.
Both players checked the river and Neugebauer mucked his hand as Cowen showed .
Issam Salem was all-in after a flop of and tabled the for the nut flush draw. The table big stack Arjel Daci made the call with for the top pair and remained ahead after the turn and river runout.
Daci is among the biggest stacks in the room as the final stages have already commenced.
After record fields in the Eureka €1,100 Main Event and €2,200 High Roller, the 2022 PokerStars European Poker Tour stop in capital of the Czech Republic has continued the path success in the crown jewel of the schedule as well. Even before the end of the late registration period, a new record attendance has already been confirmed for the 2022 EPT Prague €5,300 Main Event.
The second starting flight used every single table in the grand ballroom at Hilton Hotel Prague at some point and was bursting with poker action. Ultimately, a massive field of 825 entries emerged to boost the overall attendance to more than 1,200 entries.
With the registration still open until the cards go back in the air at noon local time, 11 players have already signed up and more are likely to follow. At least 1,238 confirmed entries, the total prize pool has surpassed €6 million and some 405 players will return to their seats in pursuit of glory.
A trio of players was able to increase the starting stack of 30,000 more than ten-fold and Pot-Limit Omaha specialist Ka Kwan Lau (322,000) edged ahead of fellow four-card aficionado Robert Cowen (321,500) by a single chip. Arjel Daci from Albania follows in third place with 302,000) and there is already a gap to Ismail Kalkan (242,500) and [Removed:431] (238,000).
Top 10 Chip Counts After Day 1b
Place
Player
Country
Chip Count
Big Blinds Day 2
1
Ka Kwan Lau
Spain
322,000
215
2
Robert Cowen
United Kingdom
321,500
214
3
Arjel Daci
Albania
302,000
201
4
Ismail Kalkan
Germany
242,500
162
5
[Removed:431]
Germany
238,500
159
6
Michael Pinto
Netherlands
220,500
147
7
Kai Uwe Lach
Germany
219,500
146
8
Petr Svoboda
Czech Republic
219,000
146
9
Nikolay Ivanov
Bulgaria
216,000
144
10
Nazar Buhaiov
Ukraine
209,500
140
Cowen has had an excellent past 12 months on the live poker circuit and took down the €10,300 EPT High Roller during the rescheduled Prague festival in March 2022 for €475,410. During the 2022 World Series of Poker in Las Vegas, the Englishman reached three final tables and won his second gold bracelet in the $50,000 Pot-Limit Omaha High Roller alongside a top prize of $1,393,816. He spent the last two months away in Brazil to relax away from the poker tables and instantly hit the ground running on the return.
Other notables with big stacks include Petr Svoboda (219,000), Ami Barer (209,000), former PokerStars ambassador Marcin Horecki (192,000), Bleron Maliqi (172,500), Lander Lijo (168,000), Erwann Pecheux (161,500), and Alexandre Reard (151,000) to name all but a few of those who made it through.
Three PokerStars ambassadors advanced in Parker Talbot (131,500), Alejandro Lococo (108,500), and Sam Grafton (64,500), while Jen Shahade was among the hundreds of casualties throughout the ten 60-minute levels. Lococo had even more reason to celebrate in the late stages of Day 1b as his home country of Argentina advanced to the finals of the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022.
Alejandro Lococo
The list of casualties on Day 1b included familiar faces such as Niko Koop, Jorryt van Hoof, Jack Sinclair, Symeon Alexandridis, Teun Mulder, Julien Martini, Kully Sidhu, Manuel Ruivo, Fedor Holz, David Boyaciyan, Gab Yong Kim, Rainer Kempe, Ana Marquez, and Maria Lampropulos, among others.
Several EPT Main Event champions were aiming to add a second title to their resume but that bid came up short for Robin Ylitalo, Sebastian Sorensson, Uri Gilboa, and Hossein Ensan. Aliaksei Boika advanced with 97,500 and Dominik Panka made it through with 91,500 as both are flirting with the average for Day 2. Both are joined by Davidi Kitai (50,500), Jan Bendik (43,500), and Ognyan Dimov (38,000) while the EPT stalwarts Juha Helppi (25,500) and Vladimir Troyanovskiy (23,000) carried over fewer chips than they started with.
All Day 1 survivors will return to their seats at noon local time on Wednesday, December 14, 2022. As of then, all levels will last 90 minutes long and the race to the money bubble and beyond begins. Late entrants before the cards go in the air start their journey with 20 big blinds at 1,000-1,500 and a big blind ante of 1,500.
The PokerNews live reporting team will be back on the floor to provide all the action on moving day. Furthermore, the live stream feature table action also commences with cards-up coverage and commentary on a security delay of 30 minutes on the PokerStars social media channels.
![[user38873]](/img/avatars/avatar.svg){kind=avatar}
flop and 
turn. The 
river was checked by both and Bueno tabled the 
as the winning hand.
and Chegdane made quad aces to knock out both players and move above 150,000.
river and Neugebauer mucked his hand as Cowen showed 
.
for the nut flush draw. The table big stack Arjel Daci made the call with 
for the top pair and remained ahead after the 
