PocketFives member and online poker superstar Crazy Cypriot went deep in the PokerStars.com World Championship of Online Poker Event #2, $500 No Limit Hold’em on Sunday, Sept. 17. With twenty players left, he, CardXfactor, and Miconwere all still in and the PocketFives community was rooting them on in force, despite the late hour. Crazy Cypriot, playing as “polpolpol,” was the only one to make the final table, but he made the most of it once there.

For the most part, Crazy Cypriot just sat back and picked his spots once at the final table of this online poker tournament. Even so, he somehow managed to accumulate chips nicely, hanging around at second or third in chips most of the way. He lost two big races near the end: his 7-7 vs J-10s when they were five handed, but he battled back from that until his A-K couldn’t outrace the chip leader’s 10-10, putting him out in third place.

Argyris was kind enough to spare a moment of his time after his online poker marathon and PocketFives.com caught him on Instant Messenger where his name was displayed as “3rddd! 120 000$ En kales gia ton pono alla thelo Braceletttt”, which we could mostly puzzle out, but wasn’t sure exactly what it meant, so we asked,

P5s: What does ‘En Kales gia ton pono alla thelo’ mean? It’s all Greek to me ; )

Crazy Cypriot: Haha, it says, 120,000 dollars are good for the pain, but I want a bracelet!!

P5s: I know it must be bittersweet coming so close to a bracelet in this major online poker event and coming up a little short. Do you have any regrets shoving the A-K, especially given that they were ready to talk deal just then?

Crazy Cypriot: I would never fold AK in such a spot, and saying yes to the deal was partly to encourage him to push! I wouldn’t accept a deal unless it was very good for me.

P5s: I noticed you weren’t really playing a ton of poker hands, but the pots you did take down were generally pretty big, not just the blinds. Was that part of your World Championship of Online Poker strategy or were you just playing tight?

Crazy Cypriot: I talk to BeL0WaB0Ve all the time, and he and I have very similar styles in these tourneys. I had to adjust, everyone was stealing and everyone becomes aware of the stealer so the open raise steal becomes ineffective. So the re-steal becomes the new steal. I didn’t make a lot of raises, but I made up for it with re-steals!

P5s: You played really well, it was fun to watch!

Crazy Cypriot: Thank you very much, a lot of races went my way and that was new to me! It was nice to run good late in a major online poker tournament for once.

P5s: Well, a little luck never hurt anyone, but I am sure that wasn’t all that got you there. So what’s up for you next, time to crash?

Crazy Cypriot: Actually, I have to go into work for a bit, then to my parent’s house to eat and sleep for a bit. Then in five hours I have to be at a wedding!

P5s: You are going in to work? What do you do other than play online poker?

Crazy Cypriot: I am a manager at a recycling firm, it is sort of family owned. Recycling is so new in Cyprus that it is expanding very rapidly!

P5s: Well congratulations on the big online poker win, and I won’t keep you as it sound like you have a busy day, any last thoughts?

Crazy Cypriot: Thank you to PocketFives for all the support, oh and most importantly I want a bracelet and I will win one soon!