While all eyes in the poker world were in Las Vegas and the WSOP Main Event final table, some serious money was dealt out in tournaments in France, too. Sam El Sayed took down the WPT Amneville event, while in Cannes Vanessa Selbst and Raphael Kroll will decide the winner heads up.


In Amneville, the Swiss player Sam El Sayed held the lead from start to finish at the World Poker Tour final table and was rewarded with a very nice cheque of €426,425 (plus a $25,000 ticket to the next WPT Championship).

1. Sam El Sayed €426,425
2. Franck Pepe €229,613
3. Ilan Boujenah €161,550
4. Nesrin Kourdourli €109,886
5. William Bresson €79,545
6. Jean-Paul Pasqualini €62,323
7. Julien Robert €46,743
8. Georges Chehade €34,442
9. Philip Legath €24,600

At the Partouche Poker Tour final table, rocked by the scandal caused by Ali Tekintamgac's disqualification because of cheating (read the news here), the ever-aggressive Vanessa Selbst dominated proceedings and takes a big lead to the heads up with the young French player Raphael Kroll.

While the slow structure of the tournament allowed for much play and produced lots of interesting hands, in the end the decisive action was quick as players busted in 4th and 3rd places in back-to-back hands. First the Finnish pro Tommi Eteläperä had his aces cracked by Selbst when the chips went in on a flop of 972, Selbst holding T8 and hitting her straight, and then right after that Kroll busted Fabrice Soulier with another drawing hand that found its' target.

Heads up play commences at 2.30pm CET (8.30am ET) and you can watch it on livestream HERE. At the startf of play, Selbst has 14.2m to Kroll's 5.5m. The winner walks away with €1.3 million, runner-up gets €800,000.

3rd Fabrice Soulier €500,000
4th Tommi Eteläperä €360,000
5th Ibrahim Raouf €300,000
6th Soren Kongsgaard €240,000
7th Cyril Andre €187,500
8th Tobias Reinkemeier €130,700