Secret is the first finalist in the Dota Pit League Season 5's European qualifiers after taking Liquid down with ease in the winners bracket finals.
Despite Team Liquid's convincing 2-0 over FlipSid3 Tactics in the first round, they were easily defeated by Secret in the second round, who were able to close the series with two sub-40 minute games. With this victory, Secret is one best-of-three win away from being the first of two European teams to qualify for the Dota Pit League Season 5's LAN finals, which will be hosted at the Spaladium Arena in Split, Croatia.
The LAN event, taking place from the 20th to 22nd of January next year, will see eight teams competing for a base prize pool of $125,000. Currently, only the attendance of the direct invitees DC and Wings has been confirmed. The other six teams are still being decided through regional qualifiers.
Of the two games Liquid played against Secret, the first was the closer one. In game one, Team Liquid went for a straight forward draft consisting of a Morphling and two gank orientated cores, the early game went smoothly for them after Secret's Pudge-Shadow Demon-Luna aggressive trilane achieved mixed results. However, when the mid-game arrived, Liquid were able to execute several ganks, but were unable to gank more than they were being ganked. Following this, Liquid were caught out twice in front of their base and lost two sets of barracks and the throne.
As for game two, smart dual lanes by Secret forced Liquid's Huskar to lane against a Timbersaw-Kotl combo, leaving him under-farmed for most of the early game. Although Amer 'Mircale-' Barqawi's Invoker entered the mid-game well farmed, his team was unable to keep up, consistently falling in team fights. As the timer ticked on, Secret farmed up and took the game.
Headline and banner image by Steffie Wunderl for ESL's Frankfurt Major album
