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Stephen Graner: Last year's EPT champion

I'm not sure if Stephen Graner knows who Salvatore Bonavena is, nor if Salvatore Bonavena knows who Stephen Graner is. But even without what just happened at Eureka Prague, those two already have a lot of shared history.

Bonavena was the EPT Prague champion back in Season 5, when he became the first Italian champion on Europe's most prestigious tour and earned €774,000 in the process. Graner was the EPT Prague champion this time last year, beating a record-breaking turnout and winning €969,000.

There are only eight people in the world who can call themselves former EPT Prague champions, and two of them were on the same table in the Eureka Prague main event today. But that table, it turns out, wasn't big enough for the both of them: Graner has just sent Bonavena to the rail.

Graner opened to 12,000 from early position, from a stack of the high 300s. (Blinds in Level 16 are 2,500-5,000 with a 500 ante.) Bonavena had a stack of around 70,000 and moved it all in, standing up as the action folded back round to Graner.

Graner asked for a count, found out that he couldn't really fold, and called with [kd][qd]. Bonavena was a big favourite with his [ad][kh], but soon found himself well behind when the flop came [3h][qs][9c]. The turn paired both of their kings. It was the [kc]. And the [7h] river was a blank.

Bonavena winced. He knows that Prague has been good to him in the past, but this was a little ugly. Graner, meanwhile, remains unbeatable in the Czech capital.

Salvatore Bonavena: Big day in Season 5

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Tournament info

- There are 217 players left at the end of Level 16
- The plan is to take a dinner break at 9pm, the end of Level 20
- Play wraps at the end of Level 22
- Other big names still involved include: Kevin MacPhee, Niall Farrell, Pierre Neuville, Martin Staszko, Balasz Botond.
German language coverage is on PokerStarsBlog.de. All the schedule information is on the EPT App, which is available on both Android or IOS.

The Eureka coverage is all handily organized on the Eureka Prague page.

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