Gambling Editor
Adriaan “Aidan” Jacobs won the inaugural African Poker Championship (APC) Tanzania $1,000 Main Event, defeating Anuj Sareen heads-up for $48,000. The victory followed a final day lasting more than 17 hours and capped a 256-entry tournament at Le Grande Casino in Dar Es Salaam, according to PokerNews.
The result carries extra weight in South Africa: Jacobs became the country’s youngest World Series of Poker bracelet winner earlier this year, only weeks after turning 21. Sareen took $32,000 for second place, while the event’s 32 paid finishers shared a $215,040 prize pool.
A second landmark in Jacobs’ breakthrough year
Jacobs is known as Aidan in the South African poker community. His WSOP milestone came with victory in the $600 Deepstack Championship No-Limit Hold’em event; the APC Main Event now gives him an inaugural title on a new live poker tour founded by Monster Jam Poker Tour creator Marc Joseph.
Young champions have made their mark on major tournament stages in different ways. Jacobs’ national age record sits alongside other high-profile youth milestones, including Lucas Jumalon’s WSOP Main Event run; his bracelet success also connects his résumé to the broader history of major bracelet wins, such as Daniel Negreanu’s eighth career bracelet.
The APC final-day marathon narrowed the field to a nine-handed final table, where Jacobs had to navigate a deep group of South African contenders and Sareen’s late resistance. The prize structure paid the top 32, with a $2,000 min-cash.
Giannakopoulos father and son fall first
Le Grande Casino owner Costa Giannakopoulos and his son Panayiotis both reached the final table, but they were its first two eliminations. Jacobs doubled through Panayiotis with aces full against trip kings before finishing him in ninth for $4,700; Costa followed in eighth for $5,800 after losing to Tome Dinh’s pocket kings.
Dinh finished third for $22,240, with Steven Radloff fourth for $16,000 and Cliton Taliwanth fifth for $12,000. Reagan Naidoo collected $9,100 in sixth, while Dimitri Hadjipaschali earned $7,100 for seventh.
Jacobs entered heads-up play with a small lead over Sareen, but the Brit doubled up three times to keep the title in play. The decisive finish came at 3:15 a.m. local time: Sareen’s ace-deuce made trip aces on the river, but he ran into Jacobs’ turned flush.
A title beyond the national milestone
The win was Jacobs’ second trademark victory of the year, according to the report, and followed his record-setting WSOP summer with a title at the first African Poker Championship. Sareen’s runner-up finish added $32,000 to a final table that also featured five South Africans among the top seven.
For Jacobs, the $48,000 score is the immediate reward; the longer-lasting marker is the combination of an inaugural regional championship with the distinction of being South Africa’s youngest WSOP bracelet winner. He closed a demanding final day by converting a narrow heads-up edge into the title, despite Sareen’s repeated comeback attempts.
