The reiteration of The International 5 grand finals was bound to happen at MLG World Finals as CDEC Gaming and Evil Geniuses meet in the second semifinals of the LAN event in New Orleans.
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Although both teams are basically the best two squads worldwide right now, given their performance at the most important tournament of the year, at the same time they also are the two teams with the least played games in the current competitive season.
And that showed a lot in CDEC Gaming's drafts and team play. Stuck in the 6.84 meta, CDEC drafted a Gyrocopter for Agressif in the first game of the series and got simply crushed by Evil Geniuses in the most one sided game of the entire tournament.
A crucial factor in EG’s dominance was once again Suma1L who played an incredible Queen of Pain. Only eight minute into the game he was already on a mega kill streak to finish the game at the 23 minute mark with a 13-1-4 personal K/D/A.
But CDEC was not ready to give up and for the second game of the series it was their time to totally demolish EG.
Same as the first game, it was the mid lane dominance that made the difference. But this time around it was Shiki’s Lina who put EG in a terrible deficit throughout the entire game. Same as Suma1L in game one, Shiki on his own put CDEC in a comfortable lead right from the 12 minute mark being on a monster kill streak due to perfect positioning in teamfights so he wouldn't get hit by Arteezy’s Anti-Mage.
Although it was clear that EG won’t be able to make any miraculous comeback CDEC preferred to play with extreme caution, pushing high ground only with the Aegis secured for Shiki which postponed the final base siege up to 40 minutes.
Evil Geniuses came into game three with a different approach and surprised CDEC with a safe lane Suma1L Slardar while Arteezy was sent mid lane on Templar Assassin. CDEC tried to replicate the mid lane dominance with a dual Night Stalker – Lich that was supposed to pressure Arteezy but ppd rotated mid as well with his Winter Wyvern in order to secure RTZ’s good start.
With better laning phase EG got their key items faster than CDEC and the minus armor became a huge problem for CDEC once TA got her Desolator and Suma1L finished the Blink Dagger. Agressif’s Doom had no impact in the game neither did Xz’s Broodmother while Universe and ppd coordinated themselves beautifully once again and secured their spot in the Grand Finals for their team with a perfectly landed Ice Blast – Rocket Flare combo.
