picture courtesy of PGL
After a 2-0 victory over Team Faceless earlier today followed by a 2-1 victory over Invictus Gaming, Evil Geniuses is now guaranteed top 3 in the Manila Masters.
An epic showdown between two of the favourites here at the Manila Masters proves to be a treat to the viewers. The series goes the distance, giving us a full three games. In the end, the North American titans EG manages to secure a 2-1 victory over the Chinese giants IG!
Game One: EG stomped IG in game 1 on the back of Syed 'Sumail' Hassan's Templar Assassin.
Game one was pretty much the Sumail show on TA. Sumail was farming extremely well throughout the game, being the highest networth since the sixth minute. Playing heavily around Sumail, EG managed to constantly increase their lead. Knowing that a huge ravage from Lin 'Xxs' Jing was the only way back for IG, EG played extremely well against it, always maintaining a good spread amongst their heroes. Finally, Sumail's TA proved to be too much for IG to handle, calling the GG just 22 minutes into the game. A flawless game for the EG mid player as he ended the game 8-0-3.
Game Two: Clutched smoke ganks was the name of the game for IG.
Not wanting to allow the momentum of Sumail to continue into game two, IG focused their attention heavily onto Sumail's QoP this time round. IG team movements in the second game was impeccable as they picked off Sumail's QoP (the highest networth of EG at that point in time) repeatedly through the use of smoke ganks.
Despite that, EG's dual core (Artour 'Arteezy' Babaev on Sven and Sumail on QoP) managed to stay on top of the networth chart through efficient farming.
Just as the game seems like it was starting to go into EG's favor, a timely smoke play by IG at the 40-minute mark caught EG by surprise and turned everything around. IG secured three huge kills with no buybacks while only losing their support Zhang 'Q' Yi on the Warlock. IG marched high ground instantly and took two sets of rax in quick succession. It was pretty much downhill for EG from here on as Ou 'Op' Peng's Storm just ball-ed out of control.
Game Three: Great draft, great laning, great plays by EG.
The best-of-three series was now down to a best-of-one! Winner moves on to the UB finals and loser drops down to LB Round 2. Knowing how important this game was, both teams were determined and going out all to secure the victory.
EG decided to put on the pressure right from the start by going for an aggressive tri-lane, leaving Saahil 'Universe' Arora in a 1vs1 match up with his classic Dark Seer against Xxs's Batrider. EG's captain Andreas 'Cr1t-' Neilsen decided it's time to give Sumail the hero that brought him to fame – Storm Spirit. With favorable lanes coupled with the good rotations from the supports, EG managed to secure an early lead (5k at 16mins).
Thereafter, it was almost flawless plays from EG, making close to no mistakes. They kept putting on the pressure, secured Aegis on Sumail's storm and just snowball their lead out of control. The game ended at the 27th minute with Sumail getting an ultra-kill, being denied his rampage by Ludwig 'Zai' Wåhlberg's Kunkka.
Evil Geniuses moves on to face Newbee in the Upper Bracket Finals, while Invictus Gaming drops to the Lower Bracket.
