Valon Olluri en tête du Jour 1A, Steve Savio se glisse dans le Top 10 provisoire
Europe's biggest poker arena at the King's Resort in Rozvadov was filled with poker enthusiasts from all over Europe, all staking their claim at potentially winning the elusive WSOP Circuit gold ring. The flagship tournament of the 2022 WSOP International Circuit in the Czech Republic kicked off and the event is off to a decent start thanks to 335 entries on the first of two starting flights.
This has put the marquee event with a buy-in of €1,700 half-way to meeting the €1,000,000 guarantee and Day 1b is expected to have another solid turnout. On top of that, players also have the chance to enter and re-enter during the first two levels on Day 2, which will take place on Sunday, January 23.
Valon Olluri ended the night atop the leaderboard with a stack of 552,500 after he gained most of the chips during a hot streak in the middle to late stages. Josef Huber almost caught up to that at the very end but fell just shy with 535,000 with the nearest follower, fellow Swiss player Silvan Boesiger (383,500) trailing by quite a margin.
Top 10 Chip Counts €1,700 Main Event Day 1a
| Position | Player | Nationality | Chip count | Big Blinds for Day 2 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Valon Olluri | Kosovo | 552,500 | 276 |
| 2 | Josef Huber | Switzerland | 535,000 | 268 |
| 3 | Silvan Boesiger | Switzerland | 383,500 | 192 |
| 4 | Sharon Ben David | Israel | 360,000 | 180 |
| 5 | Luc Ta | Germany | 355,000 | 178 |
| 6 | Abd El Ghanim | Austria | 347,000 | 174 |
| 7 | Chun Chang | Netherlands | 332,000 | 166 |
| 8 | Albert Hoekendijk | Netherlands | 318,500 | 159 |
| 9 | Majid Bozakraft | Netherlands | 309,000 | 155 |
| 10 | Steve Savio | France | 305,000 | 153 |
Other notables with big stacks include Albert Hoekendijk (318,500), Karol Konopka (214,500), Eyal Bensimhon (208,000), Stefan Drusca (200,000), Enrico Campanile (200,000), Narcis Nedelcu (184,000), and King's regular Marek Blasko (178,000). A handful of WSOP bracelet winners also took part and two of them made the cut on Day 1a in Sergiu Covrig (155,000), and Simone Andrian (143,000).
Dutchman Antoine Vranken, who won his maiden WSOP gold bracelet at the King's Resort a few months ago and added a circuit ring during the ongoing festival, was among those to bust and the same also applied for Emil Bise. Another big name to fall on the first of two starting days was defending champion Andrea Ricci, 2021 finalist Aliaksandr Shylko will also have to try again as well.
The father and son duo of Josef Gulas and Josef Gulas Jr failed to bag up chips for Day 2 just yet and can be expected to take another shot at the seven-figure prize pool. On top of the cash prizes, the top 12 finishers will also receive an entry into the 2022 WSOP Europe Main Event as well. This promotion by King's was partly responsible for setting a new attendance record and Gulas Jr turned his ticket into a seven-figure payday.
All those that came up short on Day 1a can re-enter on the second starting day, which will get underway at 2pm local time. The PokerNews live reporting team will be back then to provide as much of the action from the table as possible until a winner has been crowned.