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By : Lance Bradley
16th August 2010
When the final table began on Monday at the European Poker Tour
event in Tallinn, Estonia Arnaud Mattern had repeat on his mind.
The French poker pro started the day with the chip lead and a
victory would have made him the first player with two EPT titles
to his credit but Norway’s Kevin Stani had other ideas.
With play three-handed and Stani, Mattern and Konstantin
Bilyauer trading the chip lead amongst themselves Mattern
three-bet and Stani responded by four-betting all-in. Mattern
called and tabled pocket queens while Stani turned over
pocket threes. The flop left Mattern alone but a third three
on the turn, followed by a blank on the river, sent Mattern
to the rail in third place and Stani to the chip lead. Stani
started heads-up play with a 2-1 chip lead over the Russian Bilyauer.
Photo : EPT Tallinn Champion Kevin Stani
(photo courtesy PokerStars/Neil Stoddart)
It took only 90 minutes for Stani to dispose of Bilyauer. Stani eliminated four of the eight final table players including the final three. Bilyauer, Matter, Dmitry Vitkind and Steven van Zadelhoff all fell victim to the eventual champion.
The win is the first for Stani, who qualified via a PokerStars.com satellite, and the €400,000 (US$513,651.32) first place prize increases his lifetime earnings by over 700%. The €5,000 buy-in event attracted 420 players for a total prizepool of €1,596,000 (US$2,048,812).
The next EPT stop is less than two weeks away as poker players invade Portugal for the EPT Vilamoura on August 28th.
EPT Tallinn Final Table Payouts
1. Kevin Stani € 400,000
2. Konstantin Bilyauer € 250,000
3. Arnaud Mattern € 160,000
4. Dmitry Vitkind € 120,000
5. Mikko Jaatinen € 80,000
6. Steven van Zadelhoff € 63,000
7. Nicolo Calia € 47,000
8. Bassam Elnajjar € 32,000
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