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The Guarantee Won: WPT Cyprus Lands a $388K Overlay
- WPT Cyprus needed more entries to cover its $2M guarantee, falling $388K short.
- Only 520 players entered the $3,500 Championship, down from 775 last year.
- Six players remain; Mihai Trofim leads the final table fighting for $368,900.
WPT Cyprus needed a bigger field to cover its $2 million guarantee. It never arrived.
Registration closed at 520 entries in the $3,500 Championship, leaving the tournament $388,000 short of the advertised prize pool. That figure has now become one of the main talking points of the festival as six players return to decide who takes the title and the $368,900 first-place payout.
520 Entries Were Not Enough
The size of the overlay comes down to the distinction between the headline buy-in and the portion that actually enters the prize pool.
Each $3,500 entry contributed $3,100 towards prizes. The remaining $400 was the tournament fee. By the end of late registration, the Championship had recorded 520 entries.
That works out to $1,612,000 generated by the field, well below the promised $2 million.
| Calculation | Amount |
|---|---|
| Total buy-in | $1,612,000 |
| WPT guarantee | $2,000,000 |
| Difference | $388,000 |
The guarantee therefore added another $388,000 to bring the official prize pool to exactly $2 million. WPT set 65 paid places, ranging from a $7,700 min-cash to the $368,900 top award.
The contrast with last season is fairly stark. WPT Cyprus drew 775 entries in 2025 and produced a $2,402,500 prize pool, comfortably beyond the same $2 million guarantee. Ilia Kitsbabashvili won that edition for $401,100.
Six Players Left to Divide the Top Payouts
Mihai Trofim enters the televised final table with the chip lead after eliminating Bernardo Miguel Baptista Das Neves in seventh place.
Trofim bagged 6.225 million, followed by Chadi Rizk on 5.65 million and Farbod Nazari with 5.275 million. Weiran Pu and Sami Ayyoub sit in the middle of the pack, while Sergiu Cornea returns with nine big blinds.
| Player | Chips |
|---|---|
| Mihai Trofim | 6,225,000 |
| Chadi Rizk | 5,650,000 |
| Farbod Nazari | 5,275,000 |
| Weiran Pu | 3,800,000 |
| Sami Ayyoub | 3,650,000 |
| Sergiu Cornea | 1,325,000 |
Sixth place is worth $73,000, with the final payouts then jumping to $97,000, $130,000, $175,000 and $238,000 before reaching the $368,900 first prize. The winner’s amount includes a $10,400 WPT World Championship seat.
The final table will settle the name on the trophy. The arithmetic behind the tournament, however, is already final, and a $388,000 overlay is a considerably larger subplot than WPT Cyprus had this time last year.
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