Here are the chip counts for the start of the EPT Grand Final in Monte Carlo:
Seat 1: Herve Costa, 1,590,000
Seat 2: Roger Hairabedian, 1,130,000
Seat 3: Aleh Plauski, 1,695,000
Seat 4: Dominykas Karmazinas, 2,285,000
Seat 5: Josef Klinger, 1,170,000
Seat 6: Mesbah Guerfi, 3,670,000
Seat 7: Nicolas Chouity, 10,280,000
Seat 8: Andrew Chen, 3,670,000
PokerStars qualifier Nicolas Chouity is chip leader for the EPT Monte Carlo final
Nicolas Chouity, a 23-year-old PokerStars qualifier from Lebanon, is chip leader as the €10,600 EPT Grand Final in Monte Carlo goes into its final day.
Chouity, who won his seat in a $22 re-buy event on PokerStars, has been playing EPTs for the last two seasons and came 50th at last year’s Grand Final for a €31,000 payday. He also min-cashed at this season’s EPT Berlin event.
He goes into the final with a commanding lead of 10,130,000 chips – way more than double his nearest rivals – Mesbah Guerfi from France and Canadian PokerStars qualifier Andrew Chen. Chen has already made two PokerStars finals before – he came fifth at the PokerStars.net Latin American Poker Tour San Jose tournament in Costa Rica in November 2008 and third at EPT Prague the following month.
Chouity took over the chip lead early on Day 4 when he won a big pot against Finnish high stakes player Sami Kelopuro. He boosted his stack still further by busting Canadian JF Talbot. Of the four players who started Day 4 with more than 2 million, he’s the only one still in the tournament.
The remaining players still eyeing up the €1.7 million first prize are: PokerStars player Dominykas Karmazinas from Lithuania, Aleh Plauski from Belarus, Herve Costa from France, Roger Hairabedian from France and Austrian PokerStars player Josef Klinger.
Among the 120 players who cashed on Day 4 were Team PokerStars Pro Martin Hruby who finished 22nd for €50,000.
A total of 848 players entered the EPT Grand Final including 161 who won their seats on PokerStars. They came from 51 different countries to create a total prize pool of €8,480,000.
Watch the final table Live on The Poker Channel here from Wednesday 28th April .
