After a quick-fire Day 2 on the Hilton Prague, Hungary’s Andras Nemeth emerged victorious within the €10,200 Thriller Bounty on the 2024 PokerStars European Poker Tour, defeating Michail Manolakis in a back-and-forth heads-up battle.
Nemeth took dwelling a complete of €132,980 (inclusive of bounties) after besting the 42-entry subject, which generated an general prize pool of €406,980.
This victory represents Nemeth’s fifth triumph at an EPT occasion, a outstanding report which cements his standing as one of the completed match gamers on the planet. The Hungarian began Day 2 because the chipleader, and was by no means far-off from the highest of the standings in a high-quality efficiency.
Nemeth discovered an enormous river hero-call to place him in a commanding place three-handed, and though Manolakis discovered two double-ups to carry issues again to even, Nemeth saved his composure and in the end completed off his cussed opponent.
Manolakis can take solace in a high quality efficiency and in beating his earlier mixed lifetime recorded cashes of $40,514 in a single rating, after taking dwelling €89,300 (together with bounties).
Winner’s Response
“It feels very nice, that is my first match of the competition so it is a terrific feeling to get off to an excellent begin, particularly for the mindset, so a really good begin,” stated Nemeth.
“The hero-call was a hand the place I known as it appropriately after I might possibly made a mistake a few fingers beforehand. It felt like an excellent mixture to name in idea, and I felt my opponent could possibly be bluffing at an affordable frequency. Ace-high was going to be beating all his bluffs so I made a decision to go for it.
“When you’ve a chip lead, it is easy to really feel like you’re near successful the match, and once I doubled him up twice I might have let myself really feel prefer it’s slipping away. However the important thing for me is to remain targeted and take every hand at a time. I did not get carried away at any stage, whether or not I used to be forward or behind.”
€10,200 Thriller Bounty Outcomes
Closing Day Recap
Six entrants at the beginning of Day 2 introduced the sphere to 25 gamers, growing the general variety of entrants to 42, which generated a money prize pool of €196,980 and a bounty prize pool of €210,000. There have been plenty of early exits as Sonny Franco, Scott Margereson and Steve O’Dwyer all departed within the first stage.
After bounties got here into play at the beginning of Stage 13, the motion heated up and Candido Cappiello spiked the flop to select off Espen Jorstad and declare a bounty token. Nikita Kuznetsov obtained in on the bounty motion when he busted Simone Andrian in a three-way all in the place all gamers held pocket pairs.
The ultimate desk was set when Lander Lijo departed, with solely six locations incomes a return on funding.
Closing Desk Motion
On the outset of the ultimate desk, Manolakis held the chip lead, carefully adopted by Nemeth. Kuznetsov accomplished the highest three, albeit a way behind. Cappiello was the primary participant to exit when he succumbed to Nemeth, and he pulled a €10,000 bounty as he departed.
Kuznetsov then took a major pot in opposition to Niklas Astedt when pocket rockets and Massive Slick collided. Astedt claimed the stack of Elias Suhonen to carry in regards to the bubble, which burst promptly when Kuznetsov had Maksim Vaskresenski’s ace dominated.
Motion slowed down after that, and it was a while earlier than Astedt exited in sixth after working into the pocket sevens of Morten Klein with just one overcard. Astedt was undoubtedly suitably consoled by pulling the largest bounty of €40,000.
Klein departed in fifth after getting unfortunate with Massive Slick versus Nemeth, and the ultimate three have been set when Kuznetsov overcame a precarious preflop place to ship Ilia Pavlov to the rail in fourth.
Nemeth discovered the beforehand talked about river hero-call in opposition to Manolakis to place him in a commanding place. Nonetheless, Manolakis doubled via the Hungarian twice briefly order to retake the lead.
Kuznetsov’s journey got here to an finish in third when he jammed from the small blind however discovered Nemeth had woken up with an ace behind him.
Nemeth held a slight lead at the beginning of heads-up play, however Manolakis took a number of small pots to progressively construct a 3:1 chip benefit. Nemeth discovered a double when his ace-high held in opposition to king-high to carry the stacks again to even.
Nemeth proceeded to select off a bluff from Manolakis, and the Greek’s demise took place shortly after when Nemeth spiked an ace on the flip to beat Manolakis’ flopped second pair.
