Malta Poker Festival Grand Event - Emanuele Onnis Wins €150,000

€550 Grand Event is an event at the Malta Poker Festival which has recently concluded, and Emanuele Onnis took the victory. Onnis played in the final day for six hours before he was able to take the title and a hefty prize of €150,000. Furthermore, he also won the inaugural title and a beautiful MPF Grand Event trophy. Onnis faced Fabian Gumz in the heads up play.

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The event saw a total number of 1,366 entries who managed to crush the guaranteed pool of €500,000 and created a total prize money of €662,510. The biggest part of this prize went straight to Onnis’ pocket and this is by far considered his biggest cash in a live tournament. In fact, this is such a big jump for Onnis, that the difference from his last biggest cash is substantial. Namely, the most money he has ever won live was just €5,800. Although he gave an interview in Italian, it was clearly visible that he couldn’t hide his happiness for the victory. Other people that managed to get to the final table are Steven Iglesias, Borge Dypvik, Espen Uhlen Jorstad, Giovanni Salvatore, Henning Andre, and Nicolaj D’Antoni. The event was really mixed when it comes to nationalities, as people from all over Europe went to Malta to compete for the big prize. The final table was reserved for three Italians and three Norwegians in addition to one Swede and one German.

Gumz and Onnis decided to go to a break which was not scheduled before they decided to move to the heads-up play. The beginning of the final part did not look good for Onnis who had three times fewer chips than his opponent. In fact, Onnis was so close to hitting the rail when Gumz managed to find a pair on the flop, while Onnis created a straight with a jack-eight in his hand, and king-ten-nine on the flop. Instead, he managed to return to the game big time and get more chips.

However, Gumz decided to strike once again and doubled up with a pair of queens against the king-nine that Onnis had. Nevertheless, a couple of hands later, Onnis finally managed to gain a chip lead and went on a winning streak. He concluded the play by having pocket tens against ace-jack that Gumz had. The flop made things more interesting by revealing ten-jack-ace. In other words, Gumz created two pairs – aces and jacks, but the ten paved the way for Onnis to create three-of-a-kind with tens.

The rail then jumped and started shouting the name of the winner, as well as the name of his country – Italy. He won the first Grand Event at the Malta Poker Festival, which took place at the Portomaso Casino in Malta. If everything goes well for them, they could create a nice ongoing festival in the future.