Onwards To Kiev
Team Faceless and TNC Pro Team advanced through the main event for the Kiev Majors following a grueling main Southeast Asia (SEA) qualifying tournament.
It was cruel for Mineski though as they were beaten by both winners of the qualifiers in both the Winners and Losers Finals 1-2.
Faceless had to come from behind a set down to win the Winners’ Finals to book their ticket for Kiev, using an aggressive all-or-nothing approach that caught Mineski off-guard. The approach paid off in the final set and Singapore-based Faceless became the first SEA team to qualify.
In the Losers’ bracket, the Kiev Majors will see a team from Philippines in action as three of the top 4 teams came from the country. It was only a matter of who will represent them. TNC became that team after coming back a set down to defeat Clutch Gaming in Round 1 of losers.
They then followed that up in the Losers’ Finals. After winning the first round unconvincingly with both sides having chances to take the set, Mineski came back strong in another end-to-end round and forced the match to a third game.
But Mineski will rue not taking their chances in the first round as TNC performed when it mattered the most, taking the third game and booked the second ticket for the Kiev Majors.
For one Mineski player, it was devastating considering how many chances Mineski have to qualify and how close they were to do so in this qualifying competition.
The ‘Meracle’ That Never Was
Singaporean, Galvin ‘Meracle’ Kang has never qualified for a major international tournament, especially in DOTA 2.
Joining Philippines-based Mineski last year after completing national service, it took some time for Meracle to get his groove back.
It was thought he finally get a chance to shine in an international tournament, only for fate to have other ideas as Mineski somehow blew both chances to qualify for the Kiev Major. Now Meracle has to wait for the next international tournament and in the meantime, reflect on what has gone wrong along with his teammates.
An Interesting Note
One team in the Main SEA Qualifiers, Prestige World Wide, was one of three teams to have to go through an extra qualifying tournament in order to compete in the main qualifiers. But they did so in bizarre fashion.
Why? They were the only team that registered in the SEA Champions Qualifiers and therefore, automatically qualified without playing a game, compared to Team Bazaar and Team Bazaar.Youth having to go through many opponents in the Open SEA Qualifier #1 & #2 respectively.
However, Prestige lost all their nine group stage matches, giving them a taste of the ruthless competition.
How About The Malaysian Teams?
Both Bazaar teams and Geek Fam were the Malaysian representatives in the Main Qualifiers.
Unfortunately, all three teams failed to qualify for the top four with Team Bazaar coming the closest, just finishing in fifth where their defeat to Mineski on day 2 prove costly as the latter finished the group stages with a 6-3 record in fourth while Bazaar had a 5-4 record.
The Kiev Major will be held from 27-30 April in the National Palace of Arts.
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