Abdelhakim Zoufri Leads Last 11 After Day 2 of Event #8: €1,111 Little One for One Drop
Another tournament of the 2017 World Series of Poker Europe is closer to determining a champion and winner of a coveted golden bracelet as Event #8: €1,111 Little One for One Drop No-Limit Hold'em is down to the last 11 players. Throughout two starting days a field of 868 entries emerged to create a prize pool of €866,654 and the top 131 spots were guaranteed at least €1,660 for their efforts.
After the remaining 24 minutes of level 14 and ten full levels of one hour each were done and dusted, the official final table was narrowly missed with 11 hopefuls remaining in contention. Abdelhakim Zoufri holds a commanding lead over the other 10 finalists, having racked up 4,260,000 at the end of Day 2, almost covering the combined stacks of second-placed Thomas Hofmann (2,170,000) and third-placed Artan Dedusha (2,130,000). Zoufri has three WSOP cashes to his name so far and recently won the €3,500 No-Limit Hold'em High Roller at the WSOP International Circuit in Rotterdam back in August 2017 for his first WSOP Circuit ring.
Among the other hopefuls for the title and first-place payout of €170,764 are Day 1a chip leader Serghei Lisiy (1,965,000), Oleh Haisiuk (1,915,000), Johannes Toebbe (1,550,000), Albert Hoekendijk (1,375,000), as well as the short stacks Przemyslaw Klejnowski (625,000), Vlado Banicevic (560,000), Jonas Lauck (535,000) and Stanislav Koleno (435,000). The action will recommence on Saturday November 4th 2017 at 2 p.m. local time with blinds of 20,000/40,000 and a running ante of 5,000, and the field will combine to an unofficial final table at 10 players with €9,306 guaranteed thus far.
Day 3 Seat Assignments
| Table | Seat | Player | Country | Chip Count | Big Blinds |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 83 | 1 | Albert Hoekendijk | Netherlands | 1,375,000 | 34 |
| 83 | 3 | Stanislav Koleno | Slovakia | 435,000 | 11 |
| 83 | 4 | Artan Dedusha | United Kingdom | 2,130,000 | 53 |
| 83 | 5 | Abdelhakim Zoufri | Netherlands | 4,260,000 | 107 |
| 83 | 8 | Przemyslaw Klejnowski | Poland | 625,000 | 16 |
| 83 | 9 | Vlado Banicevic | Montenegro | 560,000 | 14 |
| 89 | 1 | Thomas Hofmann | Switzerland | 2,170,000 | 54 |
| 89 | 2 | Johannes Toebbe | Germany | 1,550,000 | 39 |
| 89 | 3 | Jonas Lauck | Germany | 535,000 | 13 |
| 89 | 7 | Serghei Lisiy | Russia | 1,965,000 | 49 |
| 89 | 9 | Oleh Haisiuk | Ukraine | 1,915,000 | 48 |
Only 143 hopefuls returned to the tables of the King's Casino in Rozvadov for Day 2 and the money bubble burst in the second level of play. Among those to leave empty-handed were such big names as Andreas Klatt, Jeff Lisandro and Tomas Fara. Witold Krawczyk was the last player to leave the tournament area without anything to show for when running with pocket eights into the pocket aces of Hannes Neurauter in the big blind.
Soon after the floodgates opened and many notables were sent on their way to the payout desk. Allen Kessler and Roland Israelashvili had to settle for a min cash worth €1,660 with the former ending up second-best with ace-seven versus pocket tens. Besim Hot and Mike Leah earned €1,738 for their efforts, while other big names such as Paul Michaelis, Marcel Luske, Barny Boatman, William Kassouf, Maria Lampropulos, Sebastian Langrock and Age Spets all busted well before the dinner break.
EPT13 Barcelona runner-up Uri Reichenstein was among the big stacks before a bluff went wrong with a busted flush draw, and Oleh Haisiuk tank-called with pocket jacks for the overpair to send Reichenstein to the rail in 47th place. Other notables such as Antoine Vranken, Alexandra Janikova, Michael Eiler and Martin Mulsow followed, and Mulsow's rise to an above-average stack came to an end when he five-bet jammed with ace-king into the pocket aces of Rene Crha.
Abdelhakim Zoufri was among the top five on the last three tables already and cemented his spotlight after winning a flip with ace-queen against the pocket tens of David Urban. Tomas Rous flopped top pair and turned two pair only to see Radek Castka snap-call his shove with pocket sevens for a set and Frank De Busscher lost a flip with pocket nines to the ace-jack of Vlado Banicevic. Zoukri knocked out several other players before the action came to a close including Alessandro Laubinger (19th place - €4,812), Day 1b chip leader Remco Verbakel (18th place - €5,900) with set of eights versus pocket aces and Willem de Jong (15th Place - €7,351).
In the last hand of the night, Rene Crha three-bet all in with king-nine suited and Johannes Toebbe called with ace-ten. Crha turned a king but a fourth diamond on the river gave Toebbe a flush to end the penultimate day with 11 players still in contention. The event is scheduled to play down to a winner tomorrow and the PokerNews live reporting team will be there to provide all the action.