Marius Pertea Wins Unibet Open Bucharest Main Event for €90,925

After seeing his chip stack get decimated three separate times, Romania's Marius Pertea built it right back up again, overcoming 502 entries to emerge victorious in the €1,100 Unibet Open Bucharest Main Event for €90,925 ($107,754).

The Grand Ballroom of the splendid JW Marriott Bucharest Grand Hotel was the venue for the 10-year anniversary of the Unibet Open. Pertea was the third Romanian to claim the Main Event title in those 10 years, and the first place prize money more than doubled his previous largest cash of $48,224 for an 11th place finish in the Main Event at the 2017 PokerStars Championship Monte Carlo.

The entrants in Bucharest combined to create a €486,940 prize pool that was divvied up among the top 71 players. Of those 502 entrants, about 200 were there thanks to winning online qualifiers at Unibet.

The final day of action found 10 players remaining, with the final table of nine reached 40 minutes later when Bogdan Ionescu (€7,920) hit the rail. Final table action that followed was punctuated by an exciting hand that saw Israel's Guy Ohayon four-bet with suited K-J, only to be KO'd by the pocket aces of Robert Vukovic from Croatia.

Ohayon bowed out in 6th place, followed shortly thereafter by Bojan Zidar, who also was eliminated by Vukovic. Four-handed play commenced and lasted for quite some time until Croatia's Pavao Veza dispatched Israeli Avi Cohen.

Veza's quest for the Main Event title ended in 3rd place, leaving Pertea and Vukovic to battle heads-up. The chip lead changed hands a number of times, with Pertea eventually pulling ahead.

Vukovic was looking to double up when he peeked down at A-Q in the big blind. The rainbow flop of K-10-6 missed him, but he bet 400K in chips when Pertea checked. The five of spades on the turn failed to improve his hand, but another check by Pertea prompted a bet of 1.1 million, to which the Romanian called.

Pertea checked again when the nine of clubs hit the board and Vukovic completed his triple barrel bluff by shoving his remaining 2.8 million chips all-in with nothing but ace-high. Pertea snap-called, tabling K-6 for two pair, slow-playing the Croatian all the way to the championship.

Unibet Open Bucharest Main Event - Final Table Results