Unibet Open Malta Main Event Won for €65,000
The Unibet Open has had its first champion hailing from the Czech Republic after Martin Soukup won the tournament’s Main Event in Malta. He walked away with an impressive first place prize of €65,000. The final took place on the last day of the tournament and started out with ten players vying for the top prize, across two five-handed tables.
The final game began poorly for the player who was in the lead. Bas de Lat had the highest number of chips and seemed to be at a comfortable advantage, but he then lost with ace-queen to ace-jack to double Christian Ostfelt, and subsequently lost another uk online portion of his chips to Vitalii Belyaev. The first player to crash out of the final was Mariusz Czarnojan, which left the final nine players competing for cash prizes. In ninth place was Emil Westerberg of Sweden who walked away with €6,400.
The Canadian Griffin Benger was next to go, despite having been in the lead for several days of the Unibet tournament. He doubled Van Lancker, and then lost the rest of his chips when his ace-king was defeated by Marzejon. Bas De Laat was back in the game temporarily but still he would be the next to go. He lost the biggest pot of the tournament against Belyaev and then check raised all in with an open ended and got called by Belyaev who had paired his seven. De Laat had to make do with seventh place and just over €10,000 in prize money. Next to go was Ostfelt who made his departure in sixth place with almost €13,000.
Six-handed play went on for some time before Tim van Meene pushed with seven-five from the small blind. Marzejon called this play instantly with ace-queen and had van Meene drawing dead on the turn. Marzejon then pushed back with fours, only to run into the Soukup’s hand of sixes. The tournament was then down to just three remaining players. Belgian player Van Lancker was showing some excellent poker skills at the table with a few good bluffs and lay downs. In the end, however, it just wasn’t enough for the title and he had to settle for third place and a prize of €29,000. The tournament was now down to a heads up finale, which stretched on for quite some time. Neither Soukup nor Belyaev were eager to play big pots. Belyaev check called three streets with a third pair and Soukup value betted all the way. It proved to be a wise move, and he had effectively won the Unibet Open Malta Main Event while Belyaev had to settle for second place prize of €45,000.
The next Unibet Open will be the Danish capital of Copenhagen; August 25th-28th.
