SharePortugal’s Ricardo De Andrade has won the EPT Barcelona €3,000 Mystery Bounty event, banking €374,064 after defeating his 1,338 rivals. He also picked up a tidy €21,000 in bounties.
The online grinder was taking part in his first European Poker Tour event, scoring his first live cash a fortnight ago in a €1,100 Estrellas Poker Tour tournament at the Casino Barcelona.
Odds Stacked Against Him
The heads-up battle was against Armin Rezaei from Austria who already had a live tournament record of more than $1,000,000 in cashes, including a career best performance in a $10K High Roller at the Aria this July which he won.Rezaei also has final table experience from the EPT Prague Main Event and WSOPE last year. So, De Andrade knew he was up against a guy who knows how to seal the deal, but he also had nothing to lose. Rezaei had also been the big stack for almost all of the final table action until that point.
By four-handed play, Razaei was dominating the table. He then eliminated Kenne and Nakdali to extend his chip lead even further, lining up against De Andrade with an 8:1 advantage. But then it all started to change.
De Andrade quickly doubled and followed up with winning a few decent size pots. He then doubled up again to take a lead over Razaei.As the hour mark approached, De Andrade found the courage to call off a big bluff from Razaei earning himself an EPT title and a nice prize to boot.
Speaking after his victory, De Andrade said: “Yesterday, around the bubble, I was running really, really good. I was chip leading on the bubble. I couldn’t lose a pot, it was insane. Today things started quiet, nothing too important. I lost a huge pot at the final table against the guy who went heads-up with me. Heads-up started with an almost ten-to-one disadvantage, but I regained my focus. I got lucky also, but first I doubled up and next I won two pots, three pots. When that happened, I felt like I’m going to take this down. The momentum was there and I was confident. I mostly play online. Live, this is my second event. My first one was in March at Estrellas Madrid. This is my first time coming to an EPT and yeah, huge score. My hands are shaking man, I don’t even know how to express it. Just to play an EPT is a dream come true, but to win an event is crazy. It’s crazy. The money is important obviously, but I think the most important thing is the trophy and winning an EPT event.”
€3,000 Mystery Bounty Final Table
| 1 | Ricardo De Andrade | €374,064 |
| 2 | Armin Rezaei | €233,890 |
| 3 | Yaman Nakdali | €167,040 |
| 4 | Marcos Kenne | €128,510 |
| 5 | Frederic Breton | €98,850 |
| 6 | Mikel Unanue | €76,030 |
| 7 | Jan Bronkhorst | €58,480 |
| 8 | Vladislav Solovev | €44,990 |
| 9 | Ismet Oral | €34,600 |
