image credits: ESL One
Digital Chaos delivered a clean 2-0 to Virtus.pro, who holds a respectable 3rd/4th place finish, sealing their ticket to a top two finish at ESL One Genting.
Game One
In game one, for a spot in the Grand Finals of ESL One Genting, Digital Chaos executed cleanly and took the win in just over 40 minutes from Virtus.pro, who looked to game two to regroup after a hard fought loss. Draftwise, DC had some very scary teamfight ultimates on the Sand King, Juggernaut, and Queen of Pain. VP decided to counter the teamfight of DC with their own teamfight sustain, picking up a Witch Doctor and Chen as well as a Pit Lord for a solid frontline.
Knowing the power of the late game Luna, DC decided to run an aggro trilane against the young Roman 'RAMZES666' Kushnarev. The strat proved very successful. Roman 'Resolut1on' Fominok's Juggernaut picked up two kills on the VP core. Ilya 'Lil' Ilyuk had some awful luck with his Chen and couldn't seem to find the right opportunity and right creep to rotate, forced to protect RAMZES against the aggressive DC lane. The midlane went relatively even in the laning stage, as despite Aliwi 'w33' Omar's aggression with his QoP Vladimir 'Noone-' Minenko still managed to stay quite even, picking up his Blink Dagger in a relatively decent time. And in the 1v1 offlane David 'MoonMeander' Tan went toe-to-toe with Pavel '9pasha' Khvastunov. Both got relatively free farm.
As the game transitioned into its middle and final stages, VP started to get their momentum back at around 15:30, taking four from DC and gaining some space for RAMZES who quickly made use of it. He shot right up to the top of the networth charts alongside Resolut1on. However, DC answered back quickly at 23, taking four from VP after losing their tier one tower with a key buyback from MoonMeander's SK. the game quickly settled into small skirmishes and farm as both teams looked for the big engagement that would net them another objective and further their item progression. With a Shadow Blade and Blink, Noone- looked to start something around the map, but DC's positioning and mobility in their draft was simply too much. The VP core could never really find anything. DC found their stepping stone to the win at 28 as they took a full set of Barracks middle and settled back into farm and map control, taking an Aegis relatively quickly at 34. After VP held valiantly and Aegis expired for DC, the NA squad quickly smoked up and rotated bottom, sealing their victory after catching Noone- and another two from VP who called GG shortly after the 40 minute mark.
Game Two
Game two's draft started off in a similar fashion, with VP picking up the Underlord once again and DC going with their SD and SK. VP decided to pick up the Jugg for themselves this time, however, deciding to eliminate the Luna-SD strat. VP decided to augment their early game aggression with an Earth Spirit for Lil along with a Lion for Alexey 'Solo' Berezin for some very nice control. DC aimed to please, giving w33 his signature Invoker this time. He went with a very interesting and successful Vanguard first build, which proved to be an absolute thorn in VP's side.
The early game saw much more aggression coming from the VP side with Lil and Solo's rotations matching Rasmus 'MiSeRy-' Filipsen's and Martin 'Saksa' Sazdov's own. Lane wise, VP decided to go core-to-core once again as RAMZES matched up against Resolut1on's CK while Moon and 9pasha went at it as well. The setup lasted only a short while as RAMZES switched with 9pasha a few minutes into the laning stage, which proved beneficial, as a rotation by Lil helped him pick up a kill on Moon. Rotations abound, the kill score went relatively even for the first 15 minutes and only really picked up in the middle and late game.
In the final phases of the contest, both teams really turned up the aggression. DC found a great victory at 15:20 in the midlane on the back of a great defensive disruption from Saksa on Resolut1on, giving Moon the opportunity to TP and land a ridiculous four man Epicenter, giving DC a four-for-one trade. VP answered back at around 18, however, trading Solo for both of DC's cores via some quick TPs. Much like last game, the contest settled into a stage of relative passivity and small skirmishes as both teams furthered their item progressions going into the final stages. DC finally took the win at around the 40 minute mark once again. DC engaged VP in their Dire jungle, with w33 tanking the damage from the entire VP squad which again, which allowed Moon to land a huge Epicenter. Resolut1on cleaned up. MVP's for sure goes to Lil, for his insane rotations, Saksa for his clutch defensive disruptions, and Moon for his incredibly well-timed and placed Epicenters.
