Tiago Luis Leads After Day 1a/b of PokerStars Summer Festival Malta €1,100 Main Event
Day 1a of the PokerStars Summer Festival Malta, running at the InterContinental Hotel, has now concluded. A total of 264 players entered the flight and, of those, 77 made it through to Day 2.
After ten levels of play, Tiago Luis of Portugal emerged as the chip leader with 340,000, which will be a stack of 266 big blinds when he sits back down for the second day.
Luis has $65,000 in recorded live cashes to his name, with all his major scores coming from tournaments in Las Vegas. He’s now on track for his first big win in Europe, too.
In close second was Maher Achour with 335,000 chips. He’s the only other player to finish the flight with over 300,000. The Tunisian player has $292,259 in recorded live cashes to his name, making him a serious contender in the tournament in terms of both chips and talent.
In third place is Lois Dufouleur, a French player who also has serious cashes which amount to $243,515. He bagged 281,000 chips.
Ercan Atmaca of the Netherlands and Florian Ahlmer of Germany round out the top five.
One of Italy's most successful players, Luca Moschitta is also in the top ten. Irish Open 2023 winner David Docherty has over double the starting stack with 109,000 chips and PokerStars Team Online pro Felix Schneiders is still in there with a short stack.
Day 1a Top 10 Chip Counts
| Rank | Player | Country | Chip Count | Big Blinds |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tiago Luis | Portugal | 340,000 | 226 |
| 2 | Maher Achour | Tunisia | 335,500 | 223 |
| 3 | Lois Dufouleur | France | 281,000 | 187 |
| 4 | Ercan Atmaca | Germany | 276,000 | 184 |
| 5 | Florian Ahlmer | Germany | 258,500 | 172 |
| 6 | Antoine Talvard | France | 237,000 | 158 |
| 7 | Giovanni Agliozzo | Italy | 231,500 | 154 |
| 8 | [Removed:471] | France | 230,500 | 153 |
| 9 | Gaspare Sposato | Italy | 228,500 | 152 |
| 10 | Luca Moschitta | Italy | 200,500 | 133 |
Day 1b has also now concluded. The second flight attracted an additional 49 entries and, of those, 17 players made it through.
That brings the total number of entries across both flights up to 313, with 94 players locking up their seat in Day 2.
The Main Event will continue with Day 1c, the third of four starting flights, which commences tomorrow at 12 p.m. local time. Day 1d will also be running later on, starting at 7 p.m. local time.
PokerNews will be bringing you live updates of Day 1c straight from the tournament floor.
