Andrey Pateychuk Wins WPT Prague

Andrey Pateychuk has just won the WPT Prague, after defeating a field of 586 players over five days to lift the title, and collect the €450,000 ($630,263) first place prize.
The 22 year-old Russian pro only cashed in at his first live tournament in May 2010, but with his latest victory in the Czech Republic now takes his live earnings to an impressive $2,119,612.
Pateychuk’s other accolades also include victory at the EPT San Remo for $975,470, and a 15th place finish at this year’s WSOP Main Event for $478,174. He has also amassed a further $229,035 playing online as “aangierr.”
As the WPT Prague final table got underway yesterday, Pateychuk was sitting in 3rd place out of the table of six. The short-stacks Russell Carson (6th for €63,000) and Sigur Eskeland (5th for €80,000) soon found themselves out and after Benjamin Pollak, too, exited in 4th (€104,000), Pateychuk was then able to wrestle the chip lead from German Stanislaw Kretz.
Pateychuk flopped a set of kings to win a big pot against the German before then cracking his pocket nines with A-6 to dispatch Kretz to the rail in 3rd (€158,000).
Pateychuk and Spanish player Adria Bagaleur then began the heads-up phase of the competition fairly even in chips. However, Pateychuk got off to a bad start after pushing his As-5s into Bagaleur’ pocket eights to go behind by a 10 to 1 chip count.
Nevertheless, Pateychuk kept on rallying back, including winning with A-6 against Bagaleur’ A-J and eventually had his opponent down to just 13BB when the final hand was played.
Bagaleur was dealt pocket queens and pushed his short-stack into Pateychuk’s A-5, who then rivered the wheel on a 4-7-9-3-2 board to relegate Adria Balaguer to a  runner-up finish worth €238,000.
Meanwhile, Andrey Pateychuk picked-up the WPT title, €450,000 in prize money, as well as a WPT Championship seat worth $25,500.