The 2024 tournament poker calendar is set to kick into overdrive over the next two months, with the EPT Cyprus Main Event representing another major stop starting on Monday.
This is the second year that the European Poker Tour has included a stop at the Merit Royal Hotel & Casino in Cyprus, with the festival running from October 9 through the conclusion of the EPT Cyprus Main Event on October 20.
Cyprus has played host to major events since 2009, with four WPT Main Tour stops in the country over the years. More recently, in addition to the EPT, the Triton Super High Roller Series, Super High Roller Bowl, and partypoker Millions have all made trips to Cyprus.
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As for the event at hand, the EPT Cyprus Main Event stands as one of just five stops on the tour for 2024. If the numbers thus far in the season are any indication, less certainly seems like more.
Will the EPT’s Million Dollar Streak Continue?
The EPT is in the midst of an impressive streak of awarding a first-place prize of at least $1 million dollars. Dating back to EPT Barcelona in 2023, six consecutive EPT champions have been awarded at least €1 million (over $1 million after conversion), and the same can be said for eight of the last nine EPT champions.
The inaugural edition of the EPT Cyprus Main Event was part of that streak in 2023, with 1,320 total entries generating a prize pool of over $6.4 million. So it’s only natural to ask if the EPT’s second year in Cyprus will continue that trend.
In terms of a potential indicator for what the turnout might be, we can take a look at how the $1,100 Eureka Cyprus Main Event is doing thus far. In 2023, there were 2,659 total entries, and as the final starting sessions play out the 2024 field has officially eclipsed it. There’s one major caveat – two additional starting sessions this time around.
The three previous EPT Main Events thus far in the 2024 season offer mixed messages as well. Barcelona experienced a slight drop from 2,120 entries in 2023 to 1,975 this year. The other two stops moved in a positive direction, though, as Monte Carlo increased turnout from 1,098 entries to 1,208 year-over-year, and Paris went from 1,606 to 1,747 entries.
By Wednesday morning, when registration for the EPT Cyprus Main Event closes at the start of Day 2, we’ll have a far clearer picture and an answer to this million-dollar question.
Will We See More From Gilles Simon and Other 2023 EPT Cyprus Finalists?
In the inaugural edition of EPT Cyprus, Gilles Simon of The Netherlands claimed his first major live tournament title and $1,042,000 – a sum that still makes up the bulk of his $1,257,748 in career live earnings. He’s been largely quiet with just five cashes since last October’s win, but he’s already cashed in a side event in Cyprus early on in this festival and will be back to defend his title.
Simon is fighting history on a couple of fronts, as no player has ever won the same EPT Main Event twice, and all three double champions in EPT history had a significant gap between their wins. Victoria Coren was the first to do so, winning EPT London in 2006 and EPT San Remo in 2014. Mikalai Pobal won EPT Barcelona in August 2012 and returned to the winner’s circle seven years later at EPT Prague in 2019. The most recent double champion, Mike Watson, won the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure to kick off 2016 and then took down his second title at EPT Monte Carlo last year.
As far as other players from the 2023 EPT Cyprus final table who could make repeat deep runs, two of the final eight from last year stand out in terms of their performances over the last 12 months. Halil Tasyurek, who finished fourth at EPT Cyprus, went on to take second in a $5K event in Cyprus in March 2024, and then narrowly missed out on a WSOP gold bracelet over the summer in the $5,000 Champions Reunion.
Nikita Kuznetsov has been racking up six-figure cashes since finishing sixth in Cyprus last year. He final tabled the $50,000 WPT Alpha8 event during the 2023 WPT World Championship festival and finished seventh in a €10,300 High Roller at EPT Paris in February. Kuznetsov then made his first career Triton final table in Montenegro in May and capped off his summer with a second-place finish in the WPT Alpha8 Trifecta finale.
Each of these players will be hoping to join some rarefied air by making back-to-back final tables in the same event, but there’s one player who could truly set herself apart with the right kind of result in Cyprus.
Will Rania Nasreddine Do The Unthinkable and Make It Three Straight EPT Final Tables?
Rania Nasreddine made major waves in late April and Early May in Monte Carlo, claiming the spotlight on the PokerStars live streams on her way to a career-best cash and third-place finish in the EPT Monte Carlo Main Event.
Once the summer wrapped up, Nasreddine returned for the EPT’s next stop, in Barcelona, and proceeded to make it back-to-back final tables. She finished one spot lower, in fourth, but the larger field size earned her $572,962, another career high water mark
If Nasreddine shows up in Cyprus, she’ll have a chance to do something no other player in the history of the European Poker Tour has done – make final tables in three consecutive EPT Main Events.