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Aliaksei Boika Wins 2016 European Poker Tour Malta Main Event

Belarusian Poker Pro Tops Field of 468 Entries To Win €355,700

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Poker tournaments frequently end in preflop coin flips or cooler situations. It’s not too often that a major tournament is won by an incredible hero call on the river with just ace high. Incredibly, that is precisely what in the 2016 European Poker Tour Malta €5,300 no-limit hold’em main event.

Aliaksei Boika was facing an all-in river shove from Mats Karlsson on a board of QHeart Suit8Spade Suit2Spade SuitKDiamond Suit7Diamond Suit after check-calling the flop and getting a check through on the turn. Boika held the ASpade SuitJHeart Suit, which he had three-bet preflop. Karlsson had just the ADiamond Suit4Diamond Suit for an inferior ace-high.

After several minutes of deep thought Boika made the call, securing the pot and the title. For the win the 28-year-old poker pro from Belarus earned €355,700 ($390,772 USD) and his first major live poker tournament title.

Boika was also awarded 1,440 Card Player Player of the Year points for the win. This was his first POY score of 2016, but it alone was enough to move him into 141st place in the overall standings.

Boika came into the final day as the short stack among the remaining six players, but was able to find a double up on only the seventh hand of the day with his pocket jacks outracing Tomas Macnamara’s ace-king. From there he was able to survive to heads-up play, entering at 4-to-3 disadvantage to Karlsson. The two only battled it out for 25 hands before the exciting final hero call to seal the deal.

Karlsson, a retired 59-year-old Swede who now resides in Malta, earned €261,730 ($287,537 USD) and 1,200 POY points for his deep run.

Here is a look at the payouts and POY points awarded at this final table:

Place Player Earnings (USD) POY Points
1 Aliaksei Boika $390,772 1440
2 Mats Karlsson $287,537 1200
3 Dmitry Yurasov $211,645 960
4 Elie Saad $155,760 720
5 Peter Ockenden $114,628 600
6 Tomas Macnamara $84,361 480
7 Bastian Dohler $61,596 360
8 Xixiang Luo $45,333 240
9 Dominik Panka $45,333 120

Winner photo courtesy of PokerStars / Danny Maxwell.