The Festival Series Malta – A Sweltering Mixed Games Success

The Festival Series landed last week at the grand Portomaso Casino in St. Julians, Malta. The series, best known for its wide range of mixed games, had its fifth stop in its two-year existence. It promised to be a real spectacle with a big Main Event, mixed games such as H.O.R.S.E, 8-Game and OFC, but also the first Mystery Bounty event in the history of The Festival Series and of course our own PokerListings Championship was part of the crowded schedule. Three full months in advance, players from all over the world were able to qualify online and turned out in large numbers for this eccentric event, this time held in the Mediterranean sun.

PokerListings Championship

In previous editions of The Festival Series, the PokerListings Championship has always been at the top of the schedule, and this time would be no different. However, this time the event had no less than three starting days, a very promising initiative. They weren’t disappointed as 354 players eventually turned up, resulting in a €250 buy-in for a total prize pool of €76,464. Never before has the prize pool been as big as in Malta, and it eventually resulted in a first prize of €16,200. In the end, a Dutchman would walk away with the gross of the prize money, as well as the unique trophy awarded by The Festival Series, and of course eternal fame!

Younes Jarir Celebrates After a Class-Act at the Final Table

Younes Jarir, a Dutch poker player who also gave act-de-presence at The Festival Series in Bratislava in 2022, was also this time together with a group of friends who came to this event. As we know, this group of friends is always there to support each other when necessary, and this time it was necessary. In Bratislava, ninth place in this eponymous event was a disappointing end, but he was confident enough to blast through to the end this time. He was opposed by not the least players; Colin Lovelock from England, our winner from the previous edition, was actually playing with a good stack throughout the event. Manuel Blaschke, the winner of the edition in Bratislava ’22, was also there. So there were two players who participated back-to-back here to go.

No one could stop Younes Jarir, however, as he was determined to win this event and finally did so by settling heads-up with former champion Manuel Blaschke from Austria.

Place	Country	Player	Prize
1		Younes Jarir	€16,200
2		Manuel Blaschke	€9,990
3		Niklas Borg	€6,690
4		Vahur Tima	€5,250
5		Karl Sundin	€4,250
6		Colin Lovelock	€3,250
7		Tanguy Pellerin	€2,574
8		Wooseun Kim	€1,930
9		Laila Hawaszadeh	€1,340

The Festival Series Malta – Main Event

The Main Event is the flagship of a tournament series, both online and live. Unfortunately, The Festival did not give a guaranteed prize pool this time, but this should not spoil the potential of this great event. It started with a quiet day 1a, in which 89 registrations were recorded, but eventually, due to a good turnout on days 1c and 1d, the total eventually came to 617 participations. The €550 Main Event, with so many registrations, within a prize pool of €296,610, is not bad for a tournament with no guaranteed prize pool! However, it was the second time in history that the event had no less than five starting days, and sufficient consideration was given to the working Maltese citizens.

Main Event	Malta ’23	Nottingham ’22	Bratislava ’22	Tallinn ’22	Bratislava ’21
Day 1A	84	129	134	58	108
Day 1B	101	138	171	123	134
Day 1C	149	224	280	250	245
Day 1D	179	118	458	71	72
Day 1E	66		144
Day 2	38		84	50	62
Total	617	609	1271	552	621

The event had 617 players registering nicely, and with 193 players returning on Day 2, it didn’t take much for the fireworks to erupt. This included players who were still able to register two levels on Day 2, another unique element in this series, who started the day with just 10-15 big blinds.

In the end, 71 players would secure a minus cash in this event, a cash for €1,000. Oystein Brenden, a poker player from Norway, had enough chips during the opening day and day 2 and even ended the day as the chip leader. They would eventually end the day with 16 players. Here are the chip counts at the start of the third and last day of the Main Event.

Player	Chips	Big Blinds
Oystein Brenden	2,240,000	90
Gytis Juskevicius	1,840,000	74
Andreas Holmsten	1,730,000	69
Stian Nostdahl	1,695,000	68
Balazs Somodi	1,625,000	65
Dario Barone	1,550,000	62
Samuel Stranak	1,280,000	51
Luigi D’Alterio	1,275,000	51
Mischa Wieten	970,000	39
Annika Haaviste	940,000	38
Clausin Sanz	745,000	30
Shimon Hagay	710,000	28
Matthew Micallef	650,000	26
Jelmer Schuurmans	520,000	21
Andras Balogh	480,000	19
Kerrien Clement	475,000	19

Final Day

The moment had arrived; The third day of the Main Event. 16 Players returned and all eyes were on the first prize of €60,700. With a couple of notable names such as Jelmer Schuurmans, Andras Balogh, Luigi D’Alterio, and Oystein Brenden, it would be a potential battlefield right until the end. Poker fans from all over the world wouldn’t be disappointed, as many big pots went up and down.

Nice detail, the final table consisted of eight different nationalities! The man with the largest rail, Oystein Brenden, eventually turned the battle in his favour by taking first place. Balasz Somodi, from Hungary, ended up being the runner-up for €40,500. Another nice fact, only Matthew Micallef from Malta managed to play his way to the final table from the last 16 with one of the shortest stacks.

The Main Event was a great success in Malta with 617 players.

Place	Country	Player	Prize
1		Oystein Brenden	€60,700
2		Balazs Somodi	€40,500
3		Luigi D’Alterio	€27,900
4		Dario Barone	€20,300
5		Stian Nostdahl	€14,560
6		Andreas Holmsten	€10,950
7		Matthew Micallef	€8,350
8		Gytis Juskevicius	€6,250
9		Mischa Wieten	€5,150

Side Events

If you look at the schedule of The Festival Series, you’ll see that they don’t just focus on the Main Event, which many other tournament series around the world still focus on. Side events, and especially mixed games, are the most important factor for these series and it paid off big time this time. With 50+ events, there were an incredible number of events available to players, events that did not exceed their expectations can probably only be counted on one hand.

The side events that topped the Leaderboard were the €250 H.O.R.S.E (69 registrations), €125 8-Game (93 registrations), €1,100 PLO High Roller (60 registrations), €1,100 NLHE High Roller (70 registrations), €250 Open Face Chinese (38 registrations), and the €250 Mystery Bounty (201 registrations).

In the end, it was the founder of The Festival Series, Martin ‘Franke’ von Zweigbergk, who won two winners’ portraits. He won the HORSE and the CashGame Challenge. The Norwegian Coolbet ambassador Svein-Olaf Eidsaeter also managed to get two by winning the Win The Button tournament and the Mystery Bounty.

Here is an overview of all the winners of the side events:

Tournament Name	Buy-in	Entries	Prize Pool	Winner	1st Prize
Sviten Special	€      250	79	€  16,353	Totti Lind	€          5,200
Texas Knock Out	€      125	130	€  13,986	Linus Lauermann	€          1,700
Heads-Up	€      250	28	€     6,048	Mantas Petrauskas	€          2,380
PLO Championship	€      250	75	€  16,200	Mirko Romeo	€          5,150
Roulette	€      125	19	€     2,006	Martin Geiba	€          1,000
Half ‘n Half	€      125	70	€     7,084	Mikael Gronvik	€          2,045
Win the Button	€      125	88	€     9,292	Svein Olav Eidsaeter	€          2,380
8-Game	€      125	93	€     9,820	Jonas Jurksaitis	€          3,350
Blackjack	€      125	25	€     2,640	Angelo Vietti	€          1,100
PLO High Roller	€   1,100	60	€  57,600	Levan Rozomashvili	€        15,400
Texas Progressive Knock Out	€      250	150	€  33,000	Joseph Jackson	€          3,500
HORSE	€      250	69	€  14,904	Martin ‘Franke’ von Zweigbergk	€          2,850
Texas High Roller	€   1,100	70	€  67,200	Cory Desmond	€        18,000
PLO 4/5/6	€      250	72	€  15,550	William Lynch	€          2,900
Matching Visions Slots	€      125	18	€     1,900	Tobias Bollmann	€          1,000
Turbo Midnight Madness I	€      125	112	€  11,827	Kai Muller	€          3,190
OFC	€      250	38	€     8,206	Aaron Kupin	€          2,880
Queens Ladies	€      125	47	€     4,963	Beate Etim	€          1,760
Texas Surprise	€      125	131	€  13,834	Salvatore Ritrovato	€          2,230
PLO/PLO8	€      125	64	€     6,758	Frank Visser	€          2,220
The Hendon Mob Championship	€      250	102	€  22,032	Jonas Engedal	€          6,100
Turbo Midnight Madness II	€      125	64	€     6,758	Guido Sanzione	€          2,250
Sportsbook	€      125	12	€        806	Sami Korpela	€             526
PLO FO	€      250	66	€  14,256	Daniele Marchesani	€          4,480
Mystery Bounty	€      250	201	€  44,220	Svein Olav Eidsaeter	€          6,400
PLO Midnight Madness	€      125	90	€     9,504	Andreas Sanden	€          1,600
Low Roller	€         60	159	€     7,632	Miguel Cuevas	€          1,800
OFC High Roller	€   1,100	20	€  19,200	Aaron Kupin	€          9,600
Seniors 49+	€      250	22	€     4,752	Gerhard Brimmers	€          1,950