The third day of TI4 has ended with Arrow Gaming still firmly at the bottom of the table, while Team Liquid’s early charge to the top ran into some trouble. Each team has played at least eight games at this point, and the fatigue should beginning to set in to affect the capabilities of the players. The First day leaders Cloud9 lost three matches in a row to drop out of the top two, surrendering the lead to ViCi Gaming.
A day of easy opponents benefitted Alliance as the Europeans managed to climb out of the drop zone with three wins over Na’ Vi.US, Mousesports and Empire. They still hover just Fnatic, who occupy the top spot in the drop, purely on strength of schedule and may not make it past this playoff stage.
Chinese Team DK pulled the biggest comeback of the day after stumbling to a 2 -3 record on the first day of the phase two playoff. Four wins over Arrow, Cloud9, Mousesports, and Empire have propelled DK to second place in the standings setting them up for automatic qualification to the main event if they are able to defend the position.
Malaysian teams had a mixed day with Titan eSports scoring a reliable 3 -2 record for the day to leave their overall tally at five wins and four losses. Titan managed to overcome an impressive challenge from 2011 Champions Na’ Vi in their second match of the day, and followed it up with a thrashing of compatriots Arrow Gaming.
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Conversely, Arrow suffered more setbacks as they lost three games to end the day with a total record of 2 – 8. Oddly enough, this Malaysian side proved to be the anti-American team as both their wins came against Team Liquid and Na’ Vi.US. An impressive record as they crashed to fellow strugglers Mousesports. It would appear that Arrow is destined for an early excited from TI4, unless they are able to create miracles over the next two days.
Arrow only has three matches tomorrow, the first of which is against best of the rest Fnatic and is followed by a challenge against NewBee an Na’ Vi. It is unlikely that Arrow manages to escape the drop zone even if it wins all three games tomorrow, which increases the pressure on the team.
Titan eSports has the more difficult match of the two with games against both Team DK and Team Liquid. Titan do not actually have to beat these teams to remain where they are, provided they are able to overcome Na’ Vi.US and Mousesports. At least one Malaysian team should be able to make the phase three playoff at this rate, and it would be wiser to bet on Titan.
Other matches to look our for would be ViCi against Team DK, and Cloud9 against iG. The games will be streamed in-game through Dota 2 and over Twitch
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