It’s an exciting time to be a pot-limit Omaha tournament player, with dedicated PLO festivals on two continents in the month of October alone. While the PGT PLO Series II rolls on in Las Vegas, the 2025 Diamond Poker Series PLO Grand Slam festival is serving up a week of four-card action at Casino Malta, highlighted by two signature events with seven-figure guarantees.
A €2 million guaranteed €10,300 buy-in event kicked off the festivities. A few days later, a €5,200 buy-in with a €1 million guarantee generated similar enthusiasm.
Hungary’s Andras Nemeth emerged from Malta as the champion in the former event. The Triton champion and high roller veteran captured the €10,300 title, defeating PLO specialist Aku Joentausta heads-up.
Gaby Livshitz, a 2021 WSOP bracelet winner, took down the €5,200 event to secure the biggest live tournament victory of his career.
Both Nemeth and Livshitz had exciting paths to victory. Read on to learn more about their respective triumphs in Malta.
Andras Nemeth Smashes Boats On Way To €10,300 PLO Win
There are all manner of different ways to win big pots in PLO, but it’s tough to beat a player that shows down seven full houses at a major final table. That was a major part of Nemeth’s journey to victory in Malta.
The Hungarian high stakes veteran secured his most significant tournament victory of 2025 in Malta. His win in the €10,300 buy-in, €2 million guaranteed opener came with $477,189 in prize money and 840 Card Player Player of the Year points, a race presented by CoinPoker.
Nemeth made a heads-up deal with PLO specialist Aku Joentausta of Finland. Joentausta banked $380,655 for second place, marking the biggest live result of his career.
The final table also featured 2019 World Series of Poker main event champion Hossein Ensan, two-time World Poker Tour champion, WSOP bracelet winner and online legend Ole Schemion, and 2023 WSOP Paradise main event winner Stanislav Zegal.
Joentausta started the final table with the chip lead, with Nemeth close behind in second. Andreas Thelin of Sweden briefly popped into the top spot, and the trio that would ultimately make up the final three traded the lead several times before Nemeth temporarily distanced himself from the pack.
Joentausta knocked off Ensan in fifth, and Nemeth utilized one of his many boats to bust Schemion in fourth.
Thelin, a relative live tournament amateur, got it in good against Nemeth, but busted in third to a rivered straight. After a heads-up deal, Nemeth blasted his way through heads-up play. On the final hand, the chips got in on the turn of a 4♥2♥2♣2♦. Nemeth’s pair of kings in his hand bested Joentausta’s pair of nines in a final battle of full houses, and Nemeth’s victory was secured.
Final Table Results
| Place | Player | Payout | POY Points |
| 1 | Andras Nemeth | $477,189 | 840 |
| 2 | Aku Joentausta | $380,655 | 700 |
| 3 | Andreas Thelin | $230,958 | 560 |
| 4 | Ole Schemion | $189,189 | 420 |
| 5 | Hossein Ensan | $151,749 | 350 |
| 6 | Stanislav Zegal | $117,702 | 280 |
| 8 | Filip Lovric | $63,999 | 140 |
| 9 | Aki Vihikainen | $51,012 | 70 |
Gaby Livshitz Takes Down €5,200 PLO
Gaby Livshitz took down an online WSOP bracelet in PLO back in 2021, but prior to this week he hadn’t won a major live PLO title. That changed in a hurry during the second signature event of the PLO Grand Slam Malta festival.
Livshitz, who is from Israel, took down the €5,200 buy-in, €1 million guaranteed event, banking $255,177 as the champion. That result, the largest for a live victory in Livshitz’s career and third-biggest result overall, came with 672 POY points.
He defeated Jelle de Kroon of the Netherlands heads-up. For the second time in three months, de Kroon set a new career-best live result in a PLO event. Back in late August, at EPT Barcelona, the Dutch player finished fifth in a €10,200 PLO event.
De Kroon held the chip lead six-handed, and while Livshitz was second at that point in the tournament, his stack slipped over the course of several major pots. But in one significant pot, against a player who managed to remain anonymous in the field, Livshitz got the chips in on the turn of a 10♠9♥6♦Q♦ with the nut straight and a redraw, and held to claim the chip lead three-handed.
Aki Vihikainen of Finland briefly took over the chip lead in a boat-over-boat spot against Livshitz. Not long after that, Livshitz became perilously short-stacked and was one card away from elimination before rivering a diamond flush against de Kroon. Another rivered flush, this time in clubs, gave Livshitz a gigantic double through Vihikainen, giving him a massive lead.
By the time Livshitz busted Vihikainen in third with a flopped straight against an overpair, his lead was at roughly 12:1. He’d make quick work of the heads-up match to leave Malta with his first recorded live PLO title.
Final Table Results
| Place | Player | Payout | POY Points |
| 1 | Gaby Livshitz | $255,177 | 672 |
| 2 | Jelle de Kroon | $173,160 | 560 |
| 3 | Aki Vihikainen | $117,000 | 448 |
| 5 | Filip Lovric | $75,641 | 280 |
| 6 | Carlo van Ravenswoud | $58,617 | 224 |
| 9 | Espen Myrmo | $25,506 | 56 |
Photos: Diamond Poker Series.
