South Australia’s Joe Sandaev has emerged victorious in the WPT Australia $2,500 8-Max tournament, defeating Luke Martinelli heads-up for his biggest career score to date.
Having finished fifth place in the WPTDeepStacks Gold Coast Main Event last year, Sandaev topped a stacked field of 208 entries for a top prize worth $117,685.
The Adelaide grinder was thrilled to have finally broken through for the win, but was quick to praise his fellow final tablists, which included first-generation online crusher Jarred Graham and WPTDeepstacks Gold Coast $5K Challenge Champion, Sean Ragozzini.
“Honestly, they were probably some of the best tournament players I’ve ever come across,” Sandaev said. “I had Sean and Luke on my left and right, but they were all super tough.”
“Coming into the final table, I only had about 16 bigs. I had to run super good … I had one big flip go my way and I got lucky in a couple of spots, so yeah! Really happy with the result!”
The win adds to the continued success of the Croweaters in WPT events, following on from Gavin Best‘s victory in the WPT Prime Gold Coast $5K Challenge back in June.
WPT AUSTRALIA $2,500 8-MAX ($2,500 buy-in, 208 entries, 26 players paid)*
| Place | Name | Country | Amount |
| 1st | Joe Sandaev | Australia | $117,685 |
| 2nd | Luke Martinelli | Australia | $81,663 |
| 3rd | Leo Kamiya | Australia | $49,063 |
| 4th | Jarred Graham | Australia | $29,852 |
| 5th | Zhengmin Zhang | Australia | $23,059 |
| 6th | Sean Ragozzini | Australia | $19,088 |
| 7th | Nabil Edggton | Australia | $16,266 |
| 8th | Adrian Indovino | Australia | $14,017 |
| 9th | Ziyue Zheng | Australia | $11,769 |
PokerMedia Australia‘s Live Reporting coverage continues tomorrow (Monday) from 12:30pm AEST with Day 2 of the $550 Action Clock. For more information, including the full schedule and structures, log onto worldpokertour.com or starpoker.com.au.
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