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Nikolay Losev opened to 27,000 preflop and Albert Daher made the call in the big blind.
Both players checked the 
board to the river where Daher fired a bet of 36,000. Losev called with 
beating the Lebanese chip leader's 
for a small pot.
First hand that has got to the river so far. Martin Schleich opened for 25,000 and Adrian Mateos Diaz called from the big blind. They saw a flop of 
. Diaz checked and called a bet of 24,000 from Schleich. The turn was the which both players checked. The river was the 
and Diaz led for 83,000 and won the pot.
Early days but a cautious start for the first few hands, a raise in position taking it down, but when Davidi Kitai opened for 27,000 Dominik Pańka called form the cut-off and the blinds folded. They saw a flop of 
. Kitai bet 32,000 and Panka let it go.
Not to worry, Albert Daher has just arrived. He only missed 10 minutes and one small blind.
Daher told PokerNews to thank everyone for the messages, but you can stop sending them now. He's fine, he's here and he's ready to play.
The players are in their seats, well apart from Albert Daher who isn't here yet. If you know him then it's probably best you tell him to come to the final table!
Level: 19
Blinds: 6,000/12,000
Ante: 2,000
Ondrej “vinkyy” Vinklarek was the EPT8 Player of the Year and already has lifetime tournament winnings totalling more than $600k.
Vinklarek, 28, from Kolin, has been a poker pro for more than four years. As a Chess Candidate Master with a FIDE ranking of 2100, he first came across poker while playing at a big chess festival where they were promoting a live poker free-roll. He said: “I didn’t know the rules and had no idea what Texas Hold’em was but it was still fun. Later on I was in a shop with friends and we saw a chip set, so we started playing home games. After that I started playing small buy-in tournaments online.”
At the time, Vinklarek was studying Maths and Physics at Charles University; the turning point in his poker career came when he entered a $24 tourney online - and won it for $6,000.
Vinklarek’s best result to date was besting a 652-strong field in last year’s WCOOP $530 NL Re-buy tourney for $160,000. His biggest live cash was runner-up in a EPT Berlin €2k last season for €63,000 and other big scores include winning a €1k side event at EPT8 Barcelona, runner-up in an EPT8 Prague €5k NL Turbo and winning an EPT Barcelona €2k NL Turbo at the start of this season.
In Season 8, the year he won EPT Player of the Year, he said: “This has definitely been a break-out 12 months for me – both the WCOOP win and now doing so well in this season’s EPT side events.”
Vinklarek, dubbed “the Czech Chris Moorman”, first took the lead in the EPT8 Player of the Year race in Prague by winning the €1k NL Turbo Bounty, finishing second in the €5k NL Turbo side event and making the final of a €1k side event. He kept up the pace at the 2012 PCA when he finished third (out of 236) in a $2k NL Turbo tourney. He has nine other cashes on the European Poker Tour worth $10k or more.
Albert Daher is a poker player from Lebanon and good friends with many of the other Lebanese poker players including Jeff Hakim who made the final of EPT Deauville last year and went deep again this time.
Daher had his biggest ever results last year over the space of a few weeks. First he came second in the Merit World Cup of Poker for $137,299 and followed this up by finishing second in the WPT Merit Classic for $160,200. Daher has cashed twice in EPT Main Events: he came 28th at EPT London in Season 9 and 72nd at EPT Barcelona in Season 10. Daher will go into the final table as the chip leader and only has eyes on winning the event.
When Panka qualified for this year’s PCA – and then won it for $1,423,096 – he was totally uknown on the live circuit. However his composure and studied determination impressed every one who saw it and when he beat EPT veteran and Dortmund champion Mike McDonald heads-up (a player with far more live tournament experience), no one saw it as anything other than a well-deserved victory.
Panka hails from the tiny town of Brześć Kujawski in Poland and before the PCA only had $8,092 in live tournament cashes to his name, the majority of that from a 42nd place finish in the EPT 10 Barcelona Estrellas €2k High Roller. After his PCA victory, Panka said: “I’m an internet player and I haven’t played many live tournaments. I only started playing live last year and I expected my first big cash to be a tenth of this! It’s weird because I didn’t feel too much pressure on the final table. I concentrated on being a rock, a statue, and now I can’t really dance with joy because I’m still in that mindset.”
Thanks to his PCA victory, Panka was understandably under the spotlight during the EPT Deauville Main Event however, yet again, he seemed wholly unruffled by the attention and spent much of his time at the table reading a thriller by Lee Child. He didn’t cash in that event but has more than made up for it by reaching the final table in the EPT Deauville High Roller.
Lundmark was already an EPT regular when he took down EPT Barcelona in Season 7 for a massive €825,000. However his first impact on the tour came in January 2010 when he was the longest-lasting Swede at the PCA - finishing in 29th place for $66,000.
Other successes on the EPT include winning an EPT9 London £1k side event and runner-up in an EPT Sanremo €2k event. Lundmark, currently tenth on Sweden’s all time money list, finished 21st in the EPT Prague High Roller last December for €18,950 and has two other EPT side event victories to his name. His lifetime tournament winnings already total nearly $2 million. Lundmark first started playing poker seven years ago after finishing high school. He is also a keen footballer and has played for a team in Sweden’s Fourth Division.
