October 31, 2024
The €600 buy-in Day 1a of the 2024 Battle of Malta Autumn Edition Main Event at Casino Malta and the Eden Arena at the InterContinental Hotel Malta was a massive success. A total of 364 runners battled it out in a marathon of a day, and 54 players (15 percent) advanced to Sunday’s Day 2 already in the money.
Humberto Lopes Galindo bagged the chip lead after parlaying his 40,000 opening stack into a whopping 1,146,000 in chips to earn the €10,000 bonus. Michael Kim Falcon was near the chip lead throughout Day 1a and ended just a starting stack behind Galindo to end the day with 1,106,000 to earn a €5,000 second-place bonus.
After that, there was quite some gap, with Nikolaos Oikonomou squeezing into the third-place position with 797,000 to earn the €3,000 third-place bonus.
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- Day 1a Chip Leader Humberto Lopes Galindo
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- Day 1a Second Place Michael Kim Falcon
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- Day 1a Third Place Nikolaos Oikonomou
Meanwhile, a pair of Estonians was near the top of the chip count. In fact, two players whose mission is to help the poker community in Estonia, Kaidar Viikman, bagged up 435,000, followed by the 2023 Battle of Malta Main Event final table Herli Olop, with 385,000.
On the other end of the spectrum was Ottavio Ferrazzano, who miraculously bagged less than a starting stack of 32,000. This is good enough for him to be already in the money along with the 53 other survivors for at least a €800 minimum cash.
Check out the final chip counts from Day 1a below, and stay tuned for an update about who won bonuses and bagged stacks during last night’s €300 buy-in on Day 1b.
| Player | Chips |
| Humberto Lopes Galindo | 1,146,000 |
| Michael Kim Falcon | 1,106,000 |
| Nikolaos Oikonomou | 797,000 |
| Gabriel Ionut Dinu | 783,000 |
| Kostadin Mihaylov | 685,000 |
| Kyriakos Papadopoulos | 655,000 |
| Giulio Di Salvo | 599,000 |
| Massimiliano Mauceri | 570,000 |
| Andreas Froehli | 513,000 |
| Kaidar Viikman | 435,000 |
| Emanuel Antonacci | 415,000 |
| Herli Olop | 385,000 |
| Fabio Ratto | 384,000 |
| Ferdinand Janssen | 381,000 |
| Luigi D’alterio | 368,000 |
| Mario Menicanin | 321,000 |
| Nikolaos Mourotis | 304,000 |
| Daniel Heredi | 265,000 |
| Nikola Krstevski | 232,000 |
| Calum Bagnall | 226,000 |
| Christian Pedersen | 214,000 |
| Giuseppe Rosa | 190,000 |
| Andrew Mackenzie | 183,000 |
| Milos Vaskovic | 180,000 |
| Victor-Dan Angelescu | 175,000 |
| Neculai Macovei | 167,000 |
| Ioannis Oikonomidis | 155,000 |
| Ivan Furniet Martinez | 146,000 |
| Antoine Talvard | 139,000 |
| Leonidas Alexopoulos | 138,000 |
| Nikolaos Valtatzis | 134,000 |
| Ben Paul Miller | 133,000 |
| Janos Kuertoesi | 132,000 |
| Clement Bonnant | 131,000 |
| Daniele Arangio | 125,000 |
| Nikola Minovic | 124,000 |
| Plamen Yordanov | 123,000 |
| Georgios Mellidis | 118,000 |
| Vasyl Laba | 114,000 |
| Simone Oddo | 106,000 |
| Daniel Yerin | 106,000 |
| Sokratis Papavramidis | 93,000 |
| Rami Awad | 87,000 |
| Giorgios Mylonas | 86,000 |
| Stavros Petychakis | 79,000 |
| Tomi Arponen | 75,000 |
| Paul-Vlad Craciunas | 74,000 |
| Radek Castka | 69,000 |
| Luca Bartoli | 66,000 |
| Dimitrios Diamantis Choulis | 60,000 |
| Nenad Srbnesovic | 60,000 |
| Sergej Babingev | 53,000 |
| Patrick Grabmann | 45,000 |
| Ottavio Ferrazzano | 32,000 |
