The group stage of the Dota 2 Bali Major 2023 has concluded as a crushing defeat for Southeast Asia region. Despite the spectacular show on the final day of the group stage, notably for Blacklist Rivalry and Bleed Esports, which were gaining a lot of attention by media outside of SEA, not a single SEA team advanced to the playoffs in the season’s final major.
Blacklist Rivalry and Bleed Esports were the only ones from SEA with a shot of advancing to the playoffs, as Execration failed to win a single match and had been eliminated earlier.
Yesterday, Blacklist faced Invictus Gaming in an important match that determined their chances of advancing to the Group A tie-breaker. Despite a string of dismal outcomes in the previous days, Blacklist stunned the crowd by defeating the Chinese team. And there was an interesting moment in their victory.
In the first game, Invictus Gaming immediately pressed Blacklist earlier in the game. The Invictus combo of Zhou “Emo” Yi and Zhou “Dust” Shiyuan efficiently suppressed Blacklist’s space. By the first 35 minutes, Invictus were ahead with 35 kills. Blacklist, on the other hand, was far behind with only 14 kills.
This situation forced Blacklist to play more patiently, focusing more on the objectives. As the match progressed, Invictus cornered Blacklist on their own base and nearly sealed their victory in 63 minutes. However, Blacklist did not give up and hindered their opponents’ assault to turn things around.
Blacklist captain Timothy “Tims” Randrup lured the Invictus players, giving enough time for his teammates to teleport to Invictus’ base and initiate a backdoor attack. Blacklist eventually won the first game with a net value differential of 47,000 gold, setting a new LAN Dota 2 record. Blacklist’s victory was a crushing blow for Invictus players, who seemed startled by the outcome and completely outsmarted in game.
On the same day, in group A, Bleed Esports, who was placed in the same position as Blacklist, had to face BetBoom, one of the EEU DPC titans, to force a tie-breaker. BetBoom led early in the first game, but the combo of Djardel “DJ” Mampusti and Damien “kpii” Chok showed up and managed to pull Bleed Esports ahead in the late game. Bleed went on to win the second game and then lost to 9Pandas in the next match, but managed to go into a tie-breaker.
Unfortunately, none of them were able to capitalise on these moments. Both Blacklist and Bleed were defeated 2-1 in their respective tier-breaker games. Blacklist was defeated by Shopify Rebellion, the DPC NA champion, while Bleed was outwitted by Azure Ray, at risk of failing to make it to the tie-breaker due to a controversial call made by the organiser yesterday.
The Dota 2 Bali Major playoffs will begin tomorrow in front of 1,000 fans at the Ayana Resort Jimbaran in Bali. All of the remaining teams will undoubtedly give their best, considering this will be the final Major to earn maximum DPC points in order to advance to The International 12, which will be hosted in Seattle, USA, in October. So far, only Talon from SEA have enough DPC points to make it directly into TI. The rest of the region will have to duke it out at the regional qualifiers.
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Adrian Sujiwohttps://www.ulti.asia/author/adriansujiwo/
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Adrian Sujiwohttps://www.ulti.asia/author/adriansujiwo/
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Adrian Sujiwohttps://www.ulti.asia/author/adriansujiwo/
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Adrian Sujiwohttps://www.ulti.asia/author/adriansujiwo/
