Smain Mamouni Wins WPTDS Marrakech Main Event for 1,000,000 MAD ($110,000)

Smain Mamouni saw off a field of 433 players to take down the WPTDeepStacks Marrakech Main Event and become the fourth winner on the inaugural WPTDeepStacks Europe season.

The Frenchman came into the day as the chipleader, but went through a topsy-turvy day before emerging to clinch the win shortly after 1am local time at the Casino de Marrakech.

Here are the full final table results:

Speaking after his victory he said he was feeling very proud of his play today.

“I didn’t make a lot of mistakes today. I lost a big pot with pocket Kings against pocket Aces, but I was not afraid of coming back in the tournament.

“I have a lot of experience, so when I was very short stacked I wasn’t afraid.

Mamouni said that the atmosphere surrounding the Casino de Marrakech really added to his deep run.

“When you play in Marrakech there’s a lot of fun, it’s not like other tournaments where nobody is talking with eachother. In Marrakech it’s something better, something good. I’ve played maybe 5-10 WPT tournaments, and obviously this was a really good one.”

There was a steady stream of bustouts throughout the day, which started with Sastre Garcia, who was quickly joined on the rail by Jean-Jacques Chantalat and Pedro Cairat. Day 1 chip leader Ludovic Moryousef (pictured above) was next, when his Ace-Four was cracked by the King-Queen of Anthony Cruz.

Malek Grabsi and Tsunamy were next meaning we had reached ten players by the first break of the day. It wasn’t long thereafter that we lost Sadry Darwiche in 10th and the unofficial final table was secured.

At this point it was Cuadrado who was at the top of the chip counts, but was closely followed by Anas Belatik, with the pair hovering around 2.5m in chips.

The last woman in the field, Elizabeth Tedder (pictured below), was unlucky to run into the Queens of Cruz to bust in 10th, with Damien Lhommeau similarly unlucky to bust when he rivered a flush only for that to give Belatik a full house.

It was Cuadrado and Belatik still bossing proceedings at the head of the leaderboard, and Belatik boosted his count with the elimination of Louis Linard in 7th.

Smain Mamouni kept himself in touch by eliminating Julien Lemonnier in 6th before the remaining five players appeared to settle in for the night.

The pace slowed and the deck’s desire to send anyone to the rail in 5th waned. First Daniel C doubled through Mamouni (pictured above), before Mamouni doubled up again. Daniel C then moved into the chip lead after a gutsy call with a pair of Jacks on the river, before Mamouni doubled up yet again!

Finally, the elimination of Anthony Cruz broke the deadlock. Cruz had been eyeing up a deeper run than he achieved in WPTDS Cannes where he finished third, but would have to settle for fifth here after running his Queen-Jack suited into the pocket nines of Daniel C.

It was Daniel C’s turn to lead the field, but his stack took a knock when Belatik doubled through him, allowing Cuadrado to retake the chip lead. Cuadrado would then eliminate Belatik in fourth place and Daniel C in third place to take the chip lead into heads-up play.

Over the short heads-up battle, Mamouni took over the chip lead after flopping a flush, and a few hands later he sealed the deal, taking home a cool 1,000,000 MAD ($110,000), the trophy and a €2,000 package to the WPTDS final in Berlin in January.