GSTL May Ro8 Day 1 - Report

There are very few things sweeter than achieving your first all-kill in a team league, but what if that all-kill was against your former team? SlayerSTaeJa did just that. Formerly known as NEXTaeJa, SlayerSTaeJa got his first chance at an all kill against his former teammate zerO. The two would duel on Xel'Naga Caverns and TaeJa would come out on top after several engagements with his bio army composition. His second match was against CoCa who had recently qualified for Code S after defeating Jinro in the Up/Down matches. After failing a high-economy Baneling bust, CoCa lost map control and found TaeJa sieged up at his door step quite quickly. After several minutes of battling back and forth, TaeJa would eventually break the door down and take the second game with relative ease. After taking down his first Code S opponent, TaeJa was about to take down another in Byun.

Byun is a much more tested veteran who has been in Code S for 2 straight seasons and was going to a third season come July. However, TaeJa showed much better skill with constant aggression. His Banshees would constantly poke around Byun's base picking off SCVs. Byun on the other hand opted for Marine drops that amounted to very little damage to his opponent. In the end it came down to a strong Marine and Tank push that caught Byun's defences out of position. This push would create a strategic beachhead in which TaeJa would slowly creep closer and closer to Byun's expansions and eventually the win.

Despite having to play another Code S veteran, the final game would come a lot easier to TaeJa than one would expect. A very powerful Marine, Tank and Banshee push would end the game in TaeJa's favour, but not before MULEs would be sent down into Kyrix's base signifying what TaeJa believed was the end of the game. Kyrix would have none of it and stayed much longer than most expected, but he would eventually leave due largely to a Banshee that had racked up 28 kills.

Match 2 almost presented a second all-kill in as many matches for the GSTL, but GuMiho fell short. Instead, GuMiho taught us a lesson that sticking to one race may prove to produce better results than playing random. GuMiho had played random in what might seem like forever ago. After a hiatus from tournament games, GuMiho returned by force. After his teammate Lucky had lost quite spectacularly to PuMa on Xel'Naga Caverns, GuMiho went to work.

GuMiho's mech build versus PuMa's bio build on Tal'Darim was dominating. Early Banshee and Hellion harass gave GuMiho plenty of control over the map as well as a slight lead. His Hellion harass caused PuMa to turtle up tight which gave GuMiho ample time to put his Siege Tanks into the perfect position. PuMa would fall with very little fight. His second game of the day was against FruitDealer. Once again he was able to prove how terrorizing Hellions can be, even without blue-flame. With almost a dozen Hellions at one point, GuMiho took out Zerglings, Drones, and even sniped Queens. FruitDealer was no match as he slowly fell behind. After defeating a Terran and Zerg player, it was only natural that TSL tested GuMiho's skill against the mighty Protoss. The third game against TricKsteR lasted much longer than his first two games, but it still resulted in a victory for GuMiho. With that last victory, it was time for his chance at an all-kill.

A slight bump in the game happened when aLive had called for a pause. It turned out that he had not set his hotkeys prior to the start of the game and asked for a pause to set them. This caused him to receive a warning from the officials as he was supposed to set the keys beforehand. However, it all paid off as aLive was able to stop the red hot GuMiho. aLive took an early lead with a Banshee, Marine, and Siege Tank push which had put a huge dent in GuMiho's economy. Despite expanding a lot earlier than aLive, GuMiho would not be able to catch up in supply and economy. He would fall short of his all-kill and aLive became the shining hope for TSL.

aLive looked as if he would take the game early with a strong Banshee, Marine, Siege Tank push against Leenock. However, Leenock would barely survive the attack and the game would be pushed into the late game. aLive quickly resumed his aggression however with another strong Siege Tank and Marine push followed by Marine drops left and right. Eventually Leenock would be forced to GG after losing his natural expansion several times as well as a large number of Drones. So it came down to one last game.

The Code S semi-finalist sC was finally sent out by the fOu coach, and he made swift work of aLive. The entire match came down to one clutch move by sC with a huge blue-flame Hellion drop that took out 27 SCVs. It was that easy. aLive had almost lined up his SCVs right for sC to destroy and he had no other choice by to do a final push into sC's main and lose his entire army. sC won a clutch game 7 for fOu.