The 5th day of the European Poker Tour Grand Final commenced on May 12th. All eight remaining players were guaranteed a cool €130,000, with all of them a chance of winning the €1.5 million first-place prize money. Ivan Freitez headed into the final day as the chip leader, and only lost the chip lead once during the final table, becoming the first Latin American to win an EPT title.
Action begun at the final table with Eugene Yanayt eliminating Andrew Li and Alex Gomes in eighth and seventh place, respectively. Andrew Li, who is known online as “azntracker“, reached PokerStars Supernova Elite status this year by playing up to 45 tables at once, collected €130,000 for his efforts. Team PokerStars Pro Alex Gomes, one of the biggest names remaining in the field, was short stacked and moved all-in from the small blind with suited connectors, holding 7s-8s, however, Eugene Yanayt woke up with pocket tens in the big blind and made the call. The board ran out K-5-3-8-5 and Gomes was out in seventh-place for €185,000.
At one point during the final table Yanayt found himself close to the chip leader, but after losing a hand when he had nines against tens, it dropped his stack to around 20 big blinds. Not long after, Yanayt three-bet shoved and got a called by Freitez with pocket nines, well ahead of Yanayt’s pocket fives. With no help for him on future streets, he was sent to the rail in sixth place.
Juan Maceiras, the last Team PokerStars Pro left standing, was down to around 15 big blinds when he shoved all-in with Jh-Th. Brinkmann made the call with big slick. The board didn’t improve Maceiras’ hand, and he was knocked out in fifth place for €315,000.
After Maceiras’ elimination there was a three-hour break from play before the EPT Grand Final action was broadcast with a two-hour delay, including the player’s hole cards. It was a first for an EPT final table to have been televised in this way.
When play eventually resumed, it was clear that Freitez had intentions of taking advantage of his chip lead. With play now four-handed, his hyper-aggressive style was just too much for the other players to cope with and he managed to win every hand in the first 20 minutes of play after the break.
Short stacked Andrey Danilyuk was the next player to be eliminated, he fell victim to Freitez, extending his chip lead even more.
A short while later, Torsten Brinkmann opened with J-8 but Tamas Lendvai three-bet shoved for 2.2 million from the small blind. Freitez, in the big blind, made the call, but Lendvai was well ahead with pocket nines against Freitez’s Ah-9h. Unfortunately for Lendvai, Freitez hit an ace on the flop and he busted out in third place for €550,000.
The heads up match began with Freitez having a commanding 4-to-1-chip advantage and he never really looked like losing it. Less than one hour into heads up play, Freitez opened with 9-T and Brinkmann decided it was time to move all-in for around 3 million with A-K and put his tournament life on the line. Freitez made the call, and a 5-2-9-6-8 board sent Brinkmann home in second for €900,000, while Freitez collected €1,500,000 for first place and took home a Shamballa Jewels bracelet and entry into the Champion of Champions freeroll tournament.