Omar Eljach Ahead of Shaun Deeb as 8 Remain in WSOP Europe Main Event

The final table is set, the stars have aligned and the WSOP Europe Main Event will produce a winner from eight superstars of the felt. With Shaun Deeb and Barny Boatman both making the last day, the stage is set for what should be a spectacular show in Rozvadov on the Czech-German border.

Early Levels See Deeb Dominate

The early levels of action saw the American player Shaun Deeb hugely dominant, as he swung the axe on multiple occasions. Early on, Simone Andrian was a casualty, with his pocket fours dominated then delivered by Saar Wilf’s pocket eights. Soon after, Quoc Nguyen was taken out by Deeb, as the former moved all-in pre-flop with king-ten. Deeb’s snap-call with ace-king saw him survive the board and chip up to 3.7 million chips as he reduced the field.

Lithuanian Vladas Tamasauskas boosted his stack to over 5.2 million when he took out Tom Bedell. The latter was all-in pre-flop with ace-four, and begged his opponent not to call, but the Lithuanian disappointed him, calling with ace-nine, and surviving the board of 8-7-3-6-A to send the luckless Bedell to the Rozvadov rail.

Boris Kolev was another big name to lose his stack early in the day, busting with ace-nine this time. Called by Onur Unsal’s shove with pocket queens, Kolev couldn’t catch up on the board and reduced the field as he built his stack to 2.9 million.

Big Names Bust to Find the Finalists

Barny Boatman was second in chips at one point and it was during that period that he ousted another opponent. Boatman played it cute, too, getting his opponent Alexander Tkastschew to shove with ace-jack on a flop of A-7-6, calling it off with ace-six to climb to 7.6 million chips.

The field was down to 17 players at that point, and the race for the final table was well and truly on. After Kenok Mariam busted in 17^th place, the unlucky Jonas Kronwitter lost his seat too. All-in with pocket kings, he lost when committed pre-flop to Armin Rezaei’s ace-king of clubs as a queen on the river landed Rezaei a Broadway straight.

Saar Wilf, Daniel Menger, Onur Unsal and Gab Yong Kim all lost their places in the tournament outside the top ten, and a short time later, Patrik Zidek busted to Deeb, catapulting the American to 15.9 million chips. After Barny Boatman doubled up to stay in contention, Timothy Adams exited in ninth place with a result worth $108,024 courtesy of his ace-four losing to Omar Eljach’s six-five.

Follow the Chip Leader

With eight players left, Omar Eljach’s late elimination of Adams saw him leapfrog Shaun Deeb to book the chip lead. Eljach’s stack of 19,480,000 is a big stack of 97 big blinds, with Shaun Deeb on 83 big blinds, 16,580,000 chips. Shaun Deeb will be shooting for a sixth WSOP bracelet but will have plenty of competition and has already fallen short twice before this series.

Jonathan Pastore is a long way back in third place, holding 9,925,000 chips, the equivalent of 50 big blinds. A mite behind him is the Romanian player Paul Covaciu, whose stack of 9,125,000 will be plenty to battle with. Behind both those players is the shark in the pack, two-time WSOP bracelet winner Barny Boatman (7,730,000), who after that late double up will have nothing to lose as he chases a third WSOP title.

Bringing up the lower order, Vladas Tamasauskas from Lithuania (5,950,000) is followed in the chipcounts by the former overnight chip leader         Alexandre Reard (5,300,000) as the Frenchman comes into play with 27 big blinds. The short-stacked player is some way back, with Austria’s Armin Rezaei (2,205,000) having just 11 big blinds to his name.

With a top prize of $1,380,129 on the line and just $138,702 the prize for whoever is first to bust in eighth place, there’s a lot hanging on the final day’s play. You can watch all the Day 4 action from the WSOP Europe Main Event right here.