It’s Day 3 of the Main Event and the record-breaking field of 5,003 entries – across five starting flights – has been whittled down just to 122 players. STOP PRESS: 82 now!!!!!!
See below for all the live stream details.
In the lead is Ivan Chegusov from Ukraine with a stack of 5,250,000. Also in contention for the €517,100 first prize are Ireland’s Conor O’Driscoll, Gavin Sardini from South Africa and Italian player Manuel Ferrari – that trio is within a 300,000 chip whisper (five big blinds) of the leader.
Sydney-bound!
We are running a remote €1,150 Day 1 for the 2026 AUD $1,000,00 guaranteed Irish Open Sydney event here tomorrow (Monday) at 4pm. We’ll be paying 15% of the field and everyone through tomorrow’s Day 1 will be in the money and win their AUD $2k entry into September’s Main Event in Australia. We’ll also be adding €1,000 for every winner to go towards flights!
If you want to satellite into that first ever remote Sydney Day 1 (and who wouldn’t!), then check out today’s €140 100k milestone satellite at 4pm today or tomorrow’s €255 50k milestone satellite at noon. If you win a seat, it’s not transferable … needs to be played in tomorrow’s Day 1. Get down under, everyone!!!
We already have our first entry for the debut Irish Open Sydney event in September. Rankin Zhou from Adelaide took down the first Irish Open-themed event at the Poker Palace, winning AUD $3,150 plus a AUD $2,000 Irish Open Sydney Main Event seat.
Main Event update – Dublin edition
The Irish Open has always been a truly international event, and players representing 60 countries have taken part in the epic 2026 Main Event. In the top ten chip count alone are representatives from eight different countries (with two each from Ireland and Romania).
The record-breaking field created a €4,852,910 prize pool which is being shared out among 736 players. The majority of them have already been to the cash desk and are now competing in other events such as the Mini or JP Poker Masters or have been celebrating / crying in the Craic Den! Or both.
The returnees include 2022 champion Steve O’Dwyer. O’Dwyer, ranked 16th in the world with $47 million in live tournament winnings to his name, said this morning: “I enter every single tournament with the intention of winning it even though I know it’s not possible. The Irish Open is the only tournament in the world where I’ve felt deep inside my body that “I -MUST- win this tournament.” That feeling has only got stronger since I won it in 2022. In the Irish Open, I am going to give 1000% effort as long as I have chips, every single time, for the rest of my life. There’s no other tournament like it in the world. I love it.”
Other notables include former champions Dan Wilson (2016), Wie Zheng (2019) and EPT London winner Ian Hamilton (660,000), 2015 runner-up Kevin Killeen (2,240,000), Rob Sherwood (2,145,000) and all-time Irish Open cashes leaderboard leader Jamie Flynn (1,130,000).
Also still in is Spanish player Gerard Carbo on 4,300,000. Carbo’s participation in Spraggy’s Quid Games gave him automatic entry into the €550 Mystery Bounty Last Longer contest the following day. He outlasted all the other Quid Gamers so, in addition to his €1,050 prize for finishing 56th, he also won a €1,150 Main Event seat. However, as he was already through to Day 2 in the Main, the organisers will be rewarding him with an equivalent ticket.
Well done to Friend of the Irish Open Raph Verdugo from Canada who is also through to Day 3.
Gavin Sardini was one of just eight South African players who entered this year’s Main Event and he will have made his home country proud as he bagged 5,015,000 after a stellar day putting him in third place at start of play today.
Everyone returning for Day 3 at noon on Sunday has locked up at least €5,970 in prize money; make it to the final nine and you’re guaranteed at least €47,800.
Among those who have already cashed are Hendon Mob brothers Barny and Ross Boatman, Friend of the Irish Open Elizabeth Bennett-Martin, PokerStars Team Pros David Lappin, Rory Jennings and Guillermo Sanz, EPT Monte Carlo champion 2016 Jan Bendik, Irish Open superfan June Jenkins, 2013 champion Ian Simpson, 2024 champion Tero Laurila, 2025 champion Simon Wilson and 2026 Ladies Champion Jen Frankenstein.
Day 10 highlights video
Live coverage
You can watch the Main Event live stream from 12.30pm here on the Irish Open website or via our YouTube channel.
The live stream will be on air from 12.30pm with a full day of Main Event coverage. Award-winning commentators James Hartigan and Joe Stapleton, plus PokerStars Team Pro Nick Walsh will be joined by 2017 Irish Open Champion Griffin Benger (who bust the Main Event late on Friday) along with newest member of Team Pro David Lappin.
If you’re in the UK or Ireland, you can watch the broadcast on the PokerStars UK YouTube channel; elsewhere, head to the PokerStars global channel. You can also watch on the PokerStars Twitch channel, or via the PokerStars LIVE Facebook page as well as the Irish Open YouTube channel.
As well as James, Joe and Nick enlightening us with their pearls of wisdom on the English language live stream, we also have some additional commentary teams covering the Main Event in German, French, Spanish and Portuguese from today. Just take your pick!
Deutsch: EPT Paris 2026 runner-up Felix ‘xflixx’ Schneiders and Team GRND on Tour will be on site at this year’s festival, broadcasting in German on their YouTube channel.
Français: Benjamin “Benny” Bruneteaux & Julien “Yu” Brecard will be on-site for their live stream, broadcasting on the Pokerstars en Francais YouTube channel during the final two days of the Main Event (April 5 and April 6).
Español: Guillermo ‘Willo’ Sanz, Alex Romero & Esteban ‘Estiwinho’ Pascual head up the commentary on site, on both the PokerStars en Espanol YouTube channel & on the PokerStars Twitch en Español channel for the final two days.
Português: Felipe De Paulo & Flavio Del Valle front the live stream commentary in Portuguese on the Pokerstars Brasil YouTube & Twitch channels.
PokerNews will also be closely monitoring Day 2 and you can read their updates from noon onwards here on the Irish Open website.
Check out our live updates page for more info – just click the event title. And don’t forget you can also see all tourney results on the PS Live app.
Follow us on socials!!!! Instagram | X | YouTube | Facebook group
For full details of the Craic Den schedule, click here. Loads of Craic Den pics are here
Registration made easy – download the Luxon app! Details are here.
