Late last month, Slovenia’s Daniel koootnikKotnik (pictured) final tabled the PokerStars Sunday Millionand earned $42,000. It remains his largest online poker cash to date by a factor of four and helped put him on the map in the PocketFives Rankings. We caught up with the European while he was firing up satellites for the Eureka Poker Tour.

“I am feeling amazing,” Kotnik told PocketFives in an exclusive interview. “I still can’t believe I shipped that much money. Throughout the tournament, I had an average chip stack and it went solidly. There were two or three times I had some luck, but I tried to play the best I could.” He is now the 25th ranked player in Slovenia and #3 in Maribor.

Although he recognizes that building a bankroll is of the utmost importance, he’s also aware that paying bills and putting food on the table would also be good uses for the money. “I was playing six-max single-table tournaments last year and then played six-max hypers. I am trying to play some Zoom NL25, but will continue with MTTs on the weekends for now. I think I am best in MTTs, so I want to continue with those.”

We should point out that on the day he final tabled the Sunday Million, he did the same in the Sunday Storm, taking seventh place for $4,100. “I started playing poker in secondary school when I was 18 and my friend sent me $1 on PokerStars,” Kotnik told us. “Now, I am studying, learning poker, and, of course, playing as much as I can.”

Let’s talk about the Slovenia poker community on PocketFives for a minute. There are 360 registered members from Slovenia (pictured) on PocketFives who have total winnings approaching $8 million. Kotnik holds the honor of having the highest cash total in the last three months from his home country.

“I would like to say thanks to all who believed in me and my abilities,” Kotnik concluded. Congrats to Kotnik on his first major score!

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