Pardon My French: Day 2 at EPT Deauville

Day 2 of the EPT5 Deauville main event is over and, like most European events, the action was breakneck from the announcement of shuffle up and deal to the final hand of the night. Today we saw the money bubble break and a handful of players duke it out at the top of the leaderboard.

We arrived as the 248 survivors from Days 1a and 1b were unbagging their chips, and it was the Devilfish David Ulliott who had the most work to do setting up his stack. Last night Ulliott made a massive run in the closing minutes, taking a big lead and finishing the day with more than $120,000.

He bested the Day 1a chip leader, Jonathan Abdellatif of Belgium, who started this morning with $105,000. This pair was joined above the $100,000 mark by Alessio Isaia of Italy. These three were head and shoulders above the rest of the field with a pack of players playing catch-up with around $80k.

The plan as told to us by tournament director Thomas Kremser called for playing another eight levels, or to 32 players, whichever came first. Starting with a relatively large number, we were a little anxious what this eight-hour day might mean for tomorrow, since we'll be playing down to the final eight.

In the end our fears were unfounded as players spewed chips all over the room. By the end of the ordained eight levels of play we were left with just 47.

Moritz Kranich

Moritz Kranich of Germany went to town this evening and jumped out to a monstrous lead with $517,000 in chips. Since he's sitting on almost $200,000 more than his nearest competitor, Michel Abecassis, the final table seems like a lock for the German.

For the full end-of-day chip counts click through and check them out here.

Plenty of pros made it to Day 2, but few were able to keep hold of their chips. Among the fallen were Freddy Deeb, Ludovic Lacay, Isabelle Mercier, Surinder Sunar, Jesper Hougaard, Gino Alacqua, Guillaume de la Gorce and Vanessa Rousso.

Looking good and coming back on Day 3 to represent the professional camp are David Ulliott with $143,000, Mika Pasasonen with $88,000 and Ivo Donev with $56,500.

PokerListings.com will be back in action tomorrow as we make a run at the final table. Make sure to hit us up and follow along as we work toward crowning the latest EPT champion. More than €800,000 is up for grabs for first, with plenty of other cash reserved for everyone who's made it this far.

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Moritz Kranich and eight other players still in qualified for their seats on PokerStars for just dollars. Think you have what it takes to do the same? Take advantage of our exclusive sign-up bonuses to find out!