posted by Abelle,
Yesterday's Starladder | ImbaTV Invitational #5 matches constituted the upper bracket of Group A, meaning that one team of four secured themselves a two-day break along with their ticket to the semifinals.


Both opening matches went to a deciding third game, which was something of a surprise in the case of the first matchup. VGJ.Thunder are theoretically one of the strongest teams at this event, but they seemed taken by surprise in their first game against Winstrike. However, VGJ.T recovered and took the series 2-1.

OpTic Gaming also dropped a game in their first series. After a quick win over Team Kinguin* in Game 1, the Polish squad fought back to take a hard-fought Game 2 win. Game 3 was more of what we've come to expect on this patch - a quick, one-sided win. The unexpected part was Quinn 'CCnC' Callahan's success with the largely forgotten Lina. Rarely picked, she turned out to be a valuable last-pick against Kinguin. With an early Eul's Scepter and Shadow Blade, OpTic's midlaner had the perfect tools to pick off Kinguin's heroes and give his team space to push.

Also, this amazing Snowball bug happened in this series that needs to be seen to be appreciated:



The final match of the day was between the two winners but it turned out to be the shortest and most decisive one yet. OpTic cruised through two sub-30-minute games, using a last-pick Broodmother for Neta '33' Shapira in Game 1 and the simple pushing power of Luna and Beastmaster in Game 2.



The win guarantees DPC points for OpTic, who are currently sitting at 0. They'll have some serious catching up to do if they hope to grab a TI invite, but it's theoretically still possible. They also get to sit out the next two days of group stage action. The StarLadder semifinals and Grand Final will take place on Sunday.



  • Abelle
    Abelle

    Abelle

    Annabelle Fischer
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