Tomasz Brzezinski‘s first live six-figure tournament score came with a fourth-place finish in the 2025 European Poker Tour Barcelona main event. Just six weeks later, the 37-year-old Polish player managed to top that performance by winning the EPT Malta main event, taking home $738,963 as the last player standing from a field of 898 entries.
Brzezinski is just the 11th player in the tour’s history to have made back-to-back main event final tables.
“It’s amazing, I cannot describe it with words. It’s just a fantastic feeling,” Brzezinski told PokerStars reporters after coming out on top. “To do it in Malta, with most of my friends here, it’s great stuff.”
This triumph grew Brzezinski’s career earnings to more than $1.4 million. The sports betting industry worker’s two big windfalls on the EPT have propelled him to 69th place in the Card Player Player of the Year standings presented by CoinPoker. He added 1,824 points with his title run inside the Casino Malta to go with the 1,080 he secured in his earlier EPT main event run and another 350 earned with a runner-up finish in a €550 Circuito Nacional de Poker event in Barcelona.
Setting The Stage
The sizable turnout for this event built a prize pool of $5,035,598, which was paid out across the top 135 finishers. Several big names ran deep, including high rollers like Tom Vogelsang (17th), five-time bracelet winner Adrian Mateos (11th), recent EPT Malta €10,200 mystery bounty event champion Juan Pardo (8th), and bracelet winner Ben Heath (7th).
The final day began with just five players remaining and Ukraine’s Mykhailo Ostash in the lead. Brzezinski was in the middle of the pack to start.
Tom-Aksel Bedell
Norway’s Tom-Aksel Bedell was the short stack when play resumed, and the high-stakes tournament mainstay was ultimately the first to hit the rail. He hung around for a couple of hours before taking his last stand with pocket deuces against the pocket threes of Ostash. Things only got worse from there for Bedell, as Ostash flopped a set. He wound up making threes full of kings by the river to win the pot and narrow the field to four. Bedell earned $234,644 for his efforts. This was his fifth final-table finish of the year, with two early titles won in high-stakes pot-limit Omaha events. He now sits in 91st place in the POY standings as a result.
Bedell was soon joined on the sidelines by Belarusian tournament star Aliaksei Boika. It was another pair-over-pair situation, but this time it was Boika who had the best of it preflop with K♦K♣ against the 5♥5♣ of Ostash. The chips didn’t get in until the river, with Ostash having made middle set on a 9♥8♠5♠4♥2♦ runout. Boika called with his overpair and was shown the bad news. Boika, who was the champion of the 2016 running of this event, earned $305,078 as the fourth-place finisher this time around. He now has more than $7.3 million in lifetime earnings.
Three To One
Adria Calonge sat at the bottom of the chip counts when the next big clash went down. The Spaniard’s final hand saw him three-bet rip over Brzezinski’s button min-raise to 250,000. Calonge had K♠5♠ and was called by the 10♥10♣ of Brzezinski. He picked up straight draw on the turn with the board showing A♥8♥2♦4♥, but the 8♠ was a blank and Brzezinski’s pair earned him the pot and the knockout. Calonge was awarded $396,630 as the third-place finisher, his largest live result by far.
Heads-up play began with 16,950,000 for Brzezinski and 10,000,000 for Ostash. That gap was narrowed a bit in the early going, leading to the final two contenders striking a deal which saw both lock up $705,578, leaving $33,385 and the trophy to play for.
The battle wore on for more than five hours after the chop was made, with plenty of swing along the way. Ostash spent much of the clash as the one with his back against the wall, but managed a staggering 11 double-ups to extend the lengthy showdown.
The final double for Ostash saw his K♦Q♣ outrun A♥8♦ for Brzezinski to give him a slight lead. Soon after that, Brzezinski won the decisive showdown of the match when his A♦J♠ held against A♥10♦. That left Ostash with fewer than two big blinds to work with.
He was soon all-in and at risk with 5♥4♠ dominated by the 10♣4♦ of Brzezinski. The Q♦J♦10♠4♣6♥ gave Brzezinski tens up and the title. Ostash headed to the payout desk to collect the massive sum he’d negotiated for while Brzezinski posed for the winner’s photo.
We have a winner! 🏆
Fourth in Barcelona, first at #EPTMalta. 🥇
Tomasz Brzezinski is the newest EPT champion, winning €631,632. 👏 pic.twitter.com/kfBsZ5oZIi
— PokerStars LIVE (@PokerStarsLIVE) October 12, 2025
Final Table Results
| Place | Player | Payout | POY Points |
| 1 | Tomasz Brzezinski | $738,963 | 1824 |
| 2 | Mykhailo Ostash | $705,578 | 1520 |
| 3 | Adria Calonge | $396,630 | 1216 |
| 4 | Aliaksei Boika | $305,078 | 912 |
| 5 | Tom-Aksel Bedell | $234,644 | 760 |
| 6 | Toni Kaukua | $180,473 | 608 |
| 7 | Ben Heath | $138,821 | 456 |
| 8 | Juan Pardo | $106,763 | 304 |
| 9 | Joao Tomas | $82,193 | 152 |
Photo credits: Rational Intellectual Holdings Ltd. / Eloy Cabacas.
