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Joey Saha finishes an impressive 7th place in EPT National

Everyone had eyes on the €1,100 EPT National Event at Casino Barcelona for multiple reasons. Firstly, it was the first major tournament of the EPT Barcelona series and secondly, we had our very own player Joey Saha making a deep run, yesterday being the only Indian to progress to Day 3 of the tournament.

He has among the top 15 stacks at the end of the day and he did brilliant early on Day 3 to chip up and be among the top 3 stacks for quite a while. Railing Malaysian pro Michael Soyza helped his case early in the day as the pay jumps silently kept rising. After Soyza’s exit, there weren’t too many known global names in the competition.

Saha himself however, was sent to the rail after making a fantastic run in this tournament. He seems to love Barcelona as a poker location, finishing 9th in the 888poker Barcelona Main Event a couple of months back, This time however, he did even better, ending in 7th place and taking home a much bigger pay-out too.

The 888poker finish was Saha’s previous best live cash but he’s gone on to beat that by a long, long way, as he recorded a new live best of €95,100 (~INR 76.44 Lakh) for this effort. He was eliminated from the tournament by Ireland’s Barry McGovern who was also the overnight chip leader on Day 2.

In this bust-out hand, the board opened 8-7-3 and both players checked the flop to see 2 on the turn. Saha bet 1.2 million only to get a shove from his opponent. Saha made the call and revealed middle pair while McGovern showed top pair. The T on the river was inconsequential as Saha became the final casualty of the day.

Day 3 Top 10 chip counts:

1. Markku Koplimaa – 39,025,000
2. Eldaras Rafijevas – 38,475,000
3. Adam Hendrix – 29,650,000
4. Barry McGovern – 15,475,000
5. Matias Arosuo – 9,150,000
6. Jose Quintas – 8,650,000

For more updates on this tournament and other poker tournaments from around the world, stay tuned to GutshotMagazine.com.

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