Mathias Moutaoukil and Niko Koop Thrive on Day 1a of the 2021 WPT Prime Paris Championship

Mathias Moutaoukil

The 2024 WPT Prime €1,100 Championship at the Club Circus Paris has been off to a decent start, as the first of five starting days attracted a total of 204 entries. This surpassed the attendance of the previous year in the French capital by more than ten percent (185 entries in 2023), setting the marquee tournament of the series on track to yet another potential seven-figure prize pool.

Best-positioned upon completion of Day 1a were Mathias Moutaoukil (917,000) and Niko Koop (880,000) with both heavily involved in the action during the late stages. Moutaoukil notched up several knockouts on the final four tables while Koop won the biggest pot of the tournament so far with a double through Gary Mamou.

Niko Koop

Other notables to advance were Matiss Celmins (740,000), Gary Benhamou (708,000), Samuel Fournier (476,000), Thomas Santerne (218,000), and 2024 Irish Open champion Tero Laurila (202,000) from Finland.

All of the 26 survivors have already locked up a cash prize and await those making it through from the remaining four flights to find out who their opponents in the money will be in a few days from now.

Plenty of notables failed to bag up chips tonight and have another four chances to advance. Among those to call were Arnaud Peyroles, Mercedes Osti, Miroslav Alilovic, defending champion Fabrice Bigot and last year’s runner-up Sabare Atmani, Sami Bechahed, as well as Julien Martini.

Day 1b will kick off on Thursday, October 24, 2024 at noon local time and many well-known poker pros of the French poker community are expected to join the action again then.

Below are the chip counts of the 26 Day 1a survivors:

Mathias Moutaoukil – 917,000 (76 bb)
Niko Koop – 880,000 (73 bb)
Matiss Celmins – 740,000 (62 bb)
Gary Benhamou – 708,000 (59 bb)
Nicolas Grasland – 540,000 (45 bb)
Thomas Rauhe – 492,000 (41 bb)
Samuel Fournier – 476,000 (40 bb)
Thibault Goncalves – 470,000 (39 bb)
Clement Delacroix – 446,000 (37 bb)
Tatsuki Ozawa – 377,000 (31 bb)
Thomas Perrin – 360,000 (30 bb)
Wahid Daas – 352,000 (29 bb)
Nassim Hamaidi – 328,000 (27 bb)
Aurelien Six – 311,000 (26 bb)
Cedric Ghanassia 299,000 (25 bb)
Romain Tanguy – 299,000 (25 bb)
Donato Di Carlo – 289,000 (24 bb)
Christophe Pommier – 264,000 (22 bb)
Eric Luong – 262,000 (22 bb)
Gary Mamou – 240,000 (20 bb)
Thomas Santerne – 218,000 (18 bb)
Kevin Garcia – 208,000 (17 bb)
Julien Delannay – 207,000 (17 bb)
Tero Laurila – 202,000 (17 bb)
Jean-Christophe Amaral – 152,000 (13 bb)
Teddy Capber – 151,000 (13 bb)