2012 PokerStars.fr EPT Deauville: Andrulis Leads The Way After Day 1a
The European Poker Tour's eighth stop of it's eighth season commenced on Monday with the 2012 PokerStars.fr EPT Deauville. A field of 339 took to the felt on Day 1a and after eight levels of play; 221 remain. On top of the counts is Kristijonas Andrulis. He bagged up a stack of 162,600 and is followed by Philippe Ma (162,200) and Elie Payan (141,800).
Five players representing Team PokerStars entered Day 1a and three survived. Henrique Pinho (55,400), Marcin Horecki (38,700), and France's own Arnaud Mattern (6,300) will return on Thursday for Day 2. Mattern was off to a nice start but hit a bump when he paid off an opponent with two pair.
A few hands later, he picked up A?A? in the big blind. With a raise and three callers in front of him, Mattern three-bet and forced out the initial raiser. The first caller, Fabien Baldeli, moved all-in for 80 percent of Mattern's stack. The other callers folded, Mattern called, and watched his aces get cracked by Q?Q? when the board ran out Q?6?3?10?5?.
Also returning on Thursday's Day 2 will be Chris Brammer (80,700), Kevin Vandersmissen (58,800), James Dempsey (50,900), Anton Ionel (45,500), Paul Berende (40,100), and Kara Scott (38,200).
Team PokerStars Pro Jonathan Duhamel hit the rail at the end of Level 6. Back-to-back hands ended his day, turning his 108-big-blind stack into no stack at all.
First, he ran 10?10? into Fabrice Gouget's J?J?. The following hand extended into the final break of the day as Duhamel got his chips into the middle with A?10? on a J?9?8?K? board. Pierre Canali looked him up with 9?9? and dodged Duhamel's many outs when the 3? river fell.
Others who did not survive Day 1a include Team PokerStars Pro Pierre Neuville, last year's runner-up Martin Jacobson, Constant Rijkenberg, Shaun Deeb, Sam Chartier, Mathew Frankland, Jan Collado, Adrien Allain and Jon Spinks.
Here are the top ten Day 1a chip counts:
| Place | Player | Chips |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Kristijonas Andrulis | 162,600 |
| 2 | Philippe Ma | 162,200 |
| 3 | Elie Payan | 141,800 |
| 4 | Julien Claudepierre | 128,200 |
| 5 | Marchel Masaladzhiu | 114,600 |
| 6 | Yoann Amaudry | 111,600 |
| 7 | Denis Patout | 102,500 |
| 8 | Pavel Perfilov | 100,300 |
| 9 | Pierre Barthelemy | 99,800 |
| 10 | Jean Marc Rigaill | 97,400 |
Day 1b kicks off at 1200 CET (0300 PST) on Tuesday and the field is expected to be significantly larger. Among those who will be playing include Team PokerStars Pros Liv Boeree and Vanessa Selbst. Even Scotty Nguyen is rumored to be in town to take part.PokerNews will be here to provide all the updates from the floor as it happens.
Following us on Twitter is the best way to keep up with the rest of the news from the tournament circuit and beyond.
