Liquid & Alliance eliminate two Chinese teams

While the UB was marked by the matchups between China and North America, the LB surprised us with some world-class games between China and Europe.

qojqva vs. vtFaded

The Chinese squad surrounding TI6 winners Zhang 'Faith Bian' Ruida and Zhang 'y`' Yiping started solid in the game, but Aydin 'INSaNIA' Sarkohi's squad knew they just need one fight to change the odds.

A perfect TP from Michael 'm`ICKe' Vu onto the botlane after EHOME overextended balanced the game. However, miCKe's Leshrac wasn't the only threat to EHOME: during those early fights Max 'Qojqva' Broecker took his time to farm his Broodmother.

16 minutes into the game Liquid fought for Rosh the first time which gave their German carry even more space in the following minutes. EHOME still tried to push the enemy jungle, but Liquid turned the fight in their favour losing only Samuel 'Boxi' Svahn and Aydin 'INSaNIA' Sarkohi, while both EHOME carries died.

Cheng 'vtFaded' Jia Hao was the key for EHOME's potential comeback: although he died once or twice in team fights his Sven kept the pace of qojqva. But in the end it wasn't enough for him to stop Liquid. The European stack won the first game!

Liquid send EHOME home

Aydin 'INSaNIA' Sarkohi realized that the combination of Lesh and Chen was difficult to counter for EHOME and this is why he decided to pick it once more. This time they were even more successful, because Max 'Qojqva' Broecker went for the Lesh mid and therefore took his opponents offguard.

This gave enough space to miCKe on Chaos Knight to take the game in his hands. Samuel 'Boxi' Svahn's Axe was also on point. EHOME didn't have a chance to set a foot in this game. In the end Liquid won the series with 2-0 sending the first Chinese team home before the arena games start.

Unfortunately, @EHOMECN’s run at the MDL Chengdu Major has come to an end as they weren’t able to defeat @TeamLiquid.

Up next we have our last match of the day opposing @theAllianceGG against Team Aster. Can Alliance knock out yet another Chinese team?#MDLChengdu pic.twitter.com/pd2XwoONUp
— Mars Media (@MarsMedia) November 19, 2019

Alliance edge out Aster

It should have been an easy game for Alliance, at least if you look at their performances over the last weeks. Yes, the European stack is in the Lower Bracket, but Team Aster's new lineup is not ready yet to take higher class teams. But Game 1 already proved that this won't be as easy as Alliance fans hoped. Nikobaby was ahead with the Faceless Void, but Team Aster kept the gold track even balanced 24 minutes in the game.

This well placed Chrono changed it all, Alliance ace'd the whole squad and took the lead with 18 to eight kills. From that point on, the game was done. Aster were able to keep Alliance out of their base for 15 minutes, but had to call 'GG' eventually.

Team Aster fight back

Let's summarize the first 30 minutes of the second game in one clip:

The game was perfect for Nikobaby's Leshrac, Aster fed him early and his team had perfectly scaling heroes to finish the game fast. However, Team Aster didn't give up and used misunderstandings in Alliance's team fights to make a fortune. The gold economy swifted to Team Aster's side after more than half an hour.

The team fights kept being muddled Song 'Sccc' Chun's Juggernaut to end the game. A few desperate team fights ended in Alliance losing all their Barracks. It was another team fight near the 60 minute mark that finished Game Two:

What an incredible finish! However, game 3 was rather one-sided: Nikobaby destroyed Team Aster with Drow Ranger. Eleven kills and 13 assists were too much for the Chinese squad to handle. Alliance has moved on to the next round.