Martin Kabrhel Bags the Chip Lead After Day 2 of the Eureka Main Event

Sometimes, shorter is better. That’s exactly what happened on Day 2 of the €1,100 Eureka Main Event at the 2024 PokerStars European Poker Tour Prague at the Hilton Prague as tournament management decided to play only six levels today.

However, a shorter day than expected didn’t mean less action because of the 707 players who returned for Day 2, only 137 managed to bag chips by the end of the day. They are the remaining players out of a record breaking field 4,732 entries, which generated a total prize pool of €4,542,720.

At the start of the day, only one Czech player was in the top ten, and it was none other than Martin Kabrhel. After a successful Day 2, he now leads the field with a massive stack of 3,720,000 chips. He is followed by Martijn Kiers (3,250,000), Ryan Plant (3,200,000), and Matthias Auer (3,065,000), who are the only other players to surpass the three-million chip mark.

Day 2 Top Ten Chip Counts

Rank	Player	Country	Chipcount	Big blinds
1	Martin Kabrhel	Czech Republic	3,720,000	124
2	Martijn Kiers	Netherlands	3,250,000	108
3	Ryan Plant	United Kingdom	3,200,000	107
4	Matthias Auer	Austria	3,065,000	102
5	Matthew Micallef	Malta	2,960,000	99
6	Magnus Persson	Sweden	2,740,000	91
7	Daniel Abrahamsson	Sweden	2,550,000	85
8	Jiri Havlena	Czech Republic	2,370,000	79
9	Andrej Desset	Slovakia	2,345,000	78
10	Adrian Cazacu	Romania	2,290,000	76

Despite a massive field of 707 players qualifying for Day 2, all competing for the first-place prize of €517,730, it was expected that a significant portion of the field would be eliminated in the early levels of the day. Day 2 did not disappoint, with roughly 300 players eliminated before the first break. Among those who exited early were Vanessa Kade (700th), Gerard Carbo (677th), Jason Wheeler (665th), last year’s EPT Prague champion Padraig O’Neill (616th), Sami Bechahed (523rd), who attributed his exit to a “massive punt” according to his social media, and Steve O’Dwyer (490th).

On the other hand, Phil Gross took the chip lead early on, becoming the first player to surpass 2,000,000 chips. He was followed by Mehdi Bilem and Emil Mattsson who cracked aces with a set to scoop a massive pot. Of these three players, only Bilem advanced to Day 3, starting with 455,000 chips.

By the next break, Martin Kabrhel claimed the top spot on the chip counts and maintained his lead until the end of the day. Even in the final minutes, he eliminated Adam Wagner with ace-king to secure his chip lead even more.

Meanwhile, Gilles Simon (296th - €3,130), Fabrice Bigot (286th - €3,590), Conor Beresford (271st), Marle Spragg (262nd), and EPT champion Robin Ylitalo (189th - €4,130) weren’t as fortunate, as they were all eliminated.

The tournament continues for PokerStars ambassador Benjamin Spragg, who made a great call during the final level to bag 1,965,000 chips. Day 1b chip leader Felix Vu also advanced to Day 3 with 1,540,000 chips, along with Jack Sinclair (1,300,000), Patrik Jaros (740,000), and the Day 2 starting chip leader Jerry Odeen (630,000).

Finally, PokerStars Team Pro Simon Wiciak has 280,000 chips left, so nine big blinds for tomorrow's Day 3.

Day 3 is set to resume at 11 a.m. local time tomorrow, Sunday, December 8 at Level 17, with blinds at 15,000/30,000, with a 30,000 big blind ante. The 137 remaining players already secured a minimum cash-prize of €5,500 and are hoping for more.

Remaining Payouts

Place	Prize	Place	Prize
1	€517,730	16-17	€22,440
2	€327,390	18-20	€19,490
3	€233,860	21-23	€16,940
4	€179,890	24-27	€14,720
5	€138,370	28-31	€12,770
6	€106,440	32-39	€11,080
7	€81,860	40-55	€9,630
8	€62,960	56-71	€8,360
9	€48,430	72-95	€7,220
10-11	€37,250	96-119	€6,310
12-13	€31,030	120-137	€5,500
14-15	€25,850