After Team Secret got eliminated yesterday in the qualifiers playoffs, Fnatic got bested by Warriors Gaming Unity today and was denied a 2016 Fall Major participation.
Fantic didn’t have a marvelous run through the group stage; nonetheless, they placed third and advanced into the qualifiers playoffs with five victories and three losses. An interesting fact is that their three dropped games were all against the other three teams that made it to the playoffs. With the same record in the group stage were Warriors Gaming Unity, a team coming from open qualifiers to deny both SEA TI6 sensations a ticket to the Boston Major. Placed to six in Seattle, TnC didn’t pass the group stage and the TI6 top four Fnatic is now eliminated, leaving Faceless, Mineski and WG Unity to fight for the two spots available for the region at the Boston Major LAN event.
Game One
Although the Fnatic vs WG Unity elimination series was scheduled for yesterday, a game coordinator problem on the SEA servers had the fight postponed for today at 10:00 SGT. Fnatic started off the series strong with a dominant performance in game one. Chai 'Mushi' Yee Fung got to play a mid lane Pugna and has been WG Unity’s nemesis with his very early ganks and overall map presence. Paired with an offlane Axe, the duo worked perfectly for Fnatic who closed the game in 35 minutes with an 18-7 kill score.
Game Two
The second game went really well for Fnatic as well, who began the laning stage with a 3-2 kill lead and almost level two supports. However, WG Unity stood their ground and punished every aggression coming out from Fnatic with return kills. The match went neck-and-neck for the entire laning stage, but Fnatic established the map control once the Warlock hit level six and they were able to push as five all the tier one towers. Despite amazing plays from WG Unity’s mid laner Kam 'NaNa' Boon Seng on his Storm Spirit who disturbed Fnatic’s push countless of times, Mushi’s team still managed to breach the high ground 26 minutes into the game via bottom lane.
But a stolen Chaotic Offering by Tue 'Ahfu' Soon Chuan saved the ranged barracks from going down and secured three kills for his team, marking the comeback moment for WG Unity.
From there on NaNa became a beast on his Storm while the Radiance Naga Siren illusions kept all the lanes pushed and created enough space for WG Unity to toy as they pleased with Fnatic. At the 45 minute mark NaNa snatched the Aegis from a full five-man Fnatic gathered around the Roshan Pit, but even so WG Unity still didn’t even try to get to Fnatic’s base, waiting instead for their adversaries to make the wrong move. Nearly ten minutes later Fnatic was punching at the Radian top lane tier three tower but the WG Unity defense was already too strong and Fnatic started to incrementally lose all the advantage.
With the Aegis and Cheese on their side, WG unity finally went for the high ground offense at the 65 minute mark. The push was unsuccessful, however, and they found themselves three minutes later defending their own tier four towers. A hectic fight in the WG unity base cost Fnatic a team wipe and left their Juggernaut and Timbersaw without buybacks, allowing WG unity to push the series into a decisive game three.
Game Three
For the third and last game, Fnatic tried to set up the advantage with a level one Roshan, but they got spotted and the affair ended with two deaths for them. The laning stage went from bad to worse for Fnatic, WG Unity matching Mushi’s Storm mid lane with a Juggernaut and shutting down Chong Xin 'Ohaiyo' Khoo’s Axe with a Tinker-Witch Doctor duo in the bottom lane. The huge amount of stuns and team fight control of WG Unity put Fnatic at a disadvantage with every skirmish, prevented the mid stage Roshan kills and in the end eliminated the SEA favorites from the Boston Major qualifiers race.
