The WPT Merit Cyprus Classic Final Table: Meet The Players

The Season XI opener has been an extravaganza of poker. 329 players from all over the world have flown into this wonderful island country in the Meditereanean sea, and for five days they have battled it out for the coveted six final table places. The final table has been set, it’s the business end of the competition, it is the World Poker Tour final table.

The action will start at 13:00 (local time) and we will be bringing you live updates from the WPT blog. Alternatively you can watch the whole event on the delayed live stream that starts at 13:30 (local time). The link to the stream can be found on the home page of the WPT site and there will be commentary from Jesse May and the likes of Michael ‘The Grinder’ Mizrachi and Dominik Nitsche.

Let’s meet the players

Seat 1: Joseph El Khoury – 435,000 chips

The great thing about poker is the many different playing styles that it incorporates. One such style is The Rock. The player who is so tight that they only play a few hands per hour. It doesn’t matter where you are in the world or what level you play at, each final table has one. The man who has somehow managed to avoid trouble and double up when it matters. At the final table of the WPT Merit Cyprus Classic our rock is 41-year old Joseph El Khoury from Lebanon.

El Khoury has been playing poker for seven years and is the owner of a tourism company. He found himself at the final table courtesy of two double ups at timely moments in the game. First he doubled through Ran Azor [Qs] [Qh] v [Ad] [Qd] and then later doubled through Victor Paraschiv on a jack high board [Kd] [Jh] v [Js] [Ts].

El Khoury’s best performance to date is a 16th place finish at the 2009 WPT Merit Cyprus Classic where he cashed for $17,300 meaning that whatever happens today he is guaranteed to receive the biggest poker payday of his career.

Seat 2: Victor Paraschiv – 1,115,000 chips

Victor Paraschiv is a 35-year old professional poker player from Romania. Paraschiv has been in the game for five years and currently ranks 22nd in the Romanian all time money list with $149,105 in live tournament cashes.

Paraschiv first got into poker after watching a PartyPoker TV commercial and thought he would give it a try. His largest cash to date is $135,000 after besting a field of 114 entries in an event held in this very casino.

In level 22 Paraschiv doubled up through the then chip leader Walid Bou Habib when he put it all on the line [Qd] [Qh] v [Th] [Ts]. Then in level 23 he rivered a flush in a hand against Ran Azor to give himself well over a million chips and enough breathing space to cruise to the final table.

Seat 3: Kiryl Radzivonau – 1,865,000 chips

At one stage in the tournament, yesterday, Kiryl Radzivonau was in danger of running away with this. A very composed young man, whom you will find wandering around the tournament area a lot, was literally taking the game apart at the seams reaching close to 3 million chips at one point.

But towards the end of the day the rest of the players started to catch the 26-year old, married, father of one and he finished the day fourth on the leaderboard. Radzivonau is ranked in second place in the all time money list for Belarusian players with $207,193 in live tournament cashes, and this casino is a favourite stomping ground of his cashing no less than 14 times in events held here.

Radzivonau also has online form with a Sunday Million victory on his resume for $175,000.

Seat 4: Marvin Rettenmaier – 2,020,000 chips

Is there anybody in the world playing more consistent poker than Marvin Rettenmaier right now? The man known as the ‘Mad One’ is continuing his trend of improving his live tournament cashing record year-after-year since 2009. This year alone he has already won over $1.6 million in live tournament earnings and joined the PartyPoker team of sponsored pros.

In May, Rettenmaier won the WPT Championships in the Bellagio for $1,196,858 when he defeated Philippe Ktorza in heads up play. This hands him the opportunity to make history as the first ever back-to-back WPT Champions. Nobody has been in this position before and incredibly Rettenmaier had to do it by climbing up the chip charts from rock bottom. He was down to as low as 140,000 chips after being bluffed off a huge pot by Sam El Sayed, but the German remained composed, played like a true champion and now starts the day third in chips.

Seat 5: Artur Voskanyan – 2,030,000 chips

Artur Voskanyan is the dark horse of this final table. The 34-year old from Russia does not have much live form, but has been playing superb poker. In fact during yesterdays play, Voskanyan, was not responsible for any of the 12 eliminations and has earned his chips through some well timed value bets and great post flop poker.

Voskanyan’s biggest pot came against the then chip leader Kiryl Radzivonau. Voskanyan nailed a [Kd] [Kc] [9s] in a three bet pot holding [Ad] [Kh] and managed to take a huge chunk of change off the young Belarusian that sets him up nicely for the final table.

Seat 6: Ran Azor – 2,405,000 chips

Like Marvin Rettenmaier, Ran Azor has been here before. Back in 2009, Azor entered the $25,000 WPT Seventh Annual Five Star World Poker Classic in Las Vegas and ended up on the final table with the likes of Yevgeniy Timoshenko, Bertrand ‘ElkY’ Grospellier, Christian Harder, Shannor Shorr and Scotty Nguyen. Azor finished second to Timoshenko, in that event, earning a staggering $1,446,265 for his runner-up spot. He will be desperate to join the WPT Champions Club and is in great shape as a late surge, yesterday, took him to the top of the chip counts.