Javier Gomez Zapatero leads Day 4 of EPT Malta with 56 players remaining

186 players returned for Day 3 of the EPT Malta Main Event to play five 90 minute levels. By the end of the day, there were only 56 players left and it was Spanish player Javier Gomez Zapatero who built the biggest stack. On Day 4 the plan is to play down to the final 16 players or to play five 90 minute levels again, whichever happens first. 

Gomez Zapatero won a big pot early on (1,5k/3k/400 ante blind level) after raising to 6,000 from UTG and 4betting to 35,000 once Nandor Solyom made it 15,400 from the cutoff. Solyom flatted then called two bets of 33,000 and 54,000 on the Q-T-8-6 board. The river was a five and both players checked, and Gomez Zapatero's A-5 won the pot with just a rivered pair of fives.

Eliminations started off fast, with almost sixty players getting eliminated in the first two blind levels. Several big names like Artem Litvinov, Jake Cody, Jack Salter and Jan Bendik were eliminated.

The money bubble burst after Atanas Kavrakov from Bulgaria shoved his final 9 big blinds (36,000 chips) with A-K, only to be called and busted by Bruno Volkmann's J-J.

After the money bubble Connor Drinan, Dan Smith, Olivier Busquet, Griffin Benger, Sorel Mizzi, Jonathan Duhamel, Benny Spindler, Sam Trickett and Martin Jacobson were eliminated, amongst others.

Several big names have advanced to Day 4 however, including Sergio Aido, Sam Chartier, Fedor "CrownUpGuy" Holz, JC Alvarado and Dominik Panka.