ShtanUdachi and Neirea are a lock for the playoffs and one more win away from a spot at worlds.
Alexey “ShtanUdachi” Barsukov and Yevgeniy “Neirea” Shumilin topped their respective groups as HCT Winter went under way at the Bahamas and Europe seems on track to a respectable record in 2017 after winning two world championships in a row.
This is ShtanUdachi’s first appearance at an HCT major, despite being one of the leading representatives of the Russian scene, together with reigning champion Pavel “Pavel” Beltukov, who’s also to compete for a Worlds berth this week. ShtanUdachi dropped a total of three games on his way to a top spot in Group A, after neither “XHope”, nor Frank “Fr0zen” Zhang managed to topple the Russian.
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Unfortunately for the APAC region, Group A’s results from yesterday meant the elimination of their Winter champion “b787”. The Japanese player brought a risky, full-control line-up including a RenoPriest, which ended up being his downfall, as it gave up a 3-1 lead against Fr0zen in the opening match.
The player to follow b787 out of the tournament was yet another champion, Americas’ best from the Winter Championship “DrJikininki”. The up-and-coming American fought hard, however, and went the full distance against both Neirea and China’s Bohan “Lovelychook” Zhang.
HCT Winter Championship continues today with eight more matches taken from groups C and D, as fans eagerly line up to see if Pavel will continue on his terrifying warpath and who will be the next two players to join ShtanUdachi and Neirea in the playoffs.
