WESG 2018 Day Three: Singularity suffer defeat; MIBR through; CLG Red set to face Those Damn Canadians
The third day of WESG 2018 has taken place, and the two remaining Americas representatives have played their matches. For North America, there was Singularity, who faced Valiance, and for South America there was MIBR, who played Viva Algeria.
Singularity came up first, and they faced the Serbian team of Valiance, with the maps selected down to Inferno, Mirage and Train. Inferno commenced the series, and Valiance were in control from the beginning, opening their T-side with the first four rounds. Singularity managed to pick one round up, but Valiance instantly came back and forced themselves to a 9-1 lead. The end of the first half was where it started to get competitive, with Singularity managing to keep themselves in the game.
The final round of the first half saw Cameron "hydrex" Kern take a Deagle 3k to limit the deficit to 11-4. The second half started strong for Singularity off the back of Ian "motm" Hardy's 1v2 clutch to secure the first five rounds. But after that Valiance came in and killed off the game, winning five rounds in a row to take the opening map 16-9.
Mirage followed, and it started strong for Singularity as they picked up seven of the first eight rounds, with Valiance picking up a single round in the middle of the run, before the tables turned and the half got close. The Serbian team picked up two rounds, and after Singularity managed to get one they followed up by dropping four. Singularity narrowly remained ahead at the break, at an 8-7 score.
The second half commenced with Valiance picking up the pistol and anti-eco round, before Singularity returned fire with a block of four rounds to return into the lead. That lead wouldn't last forever, as Valiance picked up five rounds in a row to take the lead, and a 14th round. Singularity managed to even the game towards the end, before the two teams forced the map into overtime. From there, Valiance went into the final gear and secured the game 19-17, eliminating Singularity from competition.
In the other match, MIBR faced Viva Algeria with Train, Dust and Inferno selected as maps. Train was, as expected, an exceptionally strong showing for MIBR. The Brazilians started on the T-side, and raced up to a 13-0 lead before the Algerians were able to take a round. Before then, their closest attempt was broken down by Gabriel "FalleN" Toledo and João "felps" Vasconcellos in a 2v4 to win the round.
The first half ended 14-1, and after the T-side pistol round MIBR had map point. After Anis "Ninis" Ounassar picked up a 1v2 clutch in the second half, the Algerian's tournament life was extended for a number of rounds, but it was nearly inevitable as MIBR closed the map out as 16-5 winners.
Dust2 followed, and it was an even more brutal map win for MIBR. Racking up a 7-0 lead before Viva Algeria picked up their one and only round of the map, Fernando "fer" Alvarenga proved to be his team's strongest performer as he picked up 129.2 in ADR and a 1.98 rating in the second map. MIBR picked up and won every round following, for a 16-1 win and a 2-0 score in the series.
This result means that MIBR remain the only Americas representatives in China, and will be facing Windigo in the next round, at 6:00 AM EDT tomorrow.
In the Female tournament, the Americas region had three teams representing over the two groups. Canada's Those Damn Canadians, featuring LiviD's Danny "huynh" Huynh as coach, America's CLG Red and Brazil's paiN fe.
Group A featured CLG Red and paiN fe. Both teams faced off against each other in the first game, with CLG Red coming out with a strong 2-0 win (Train 16-4, Cache 16-13). CLG Red then faced Australia's Carnage fe, taking another 2-0 win (Train 16-2, Cache 16-5) while paiN fe beat TYLOO fe 2-0 (Inferno 16-13, Mirage 16-1). paiN fe then faced Carnage fe, where the teams split points after a 1-1 result (Cache 2-16, Mirage 16-12) while CLG Red completed their perfect record at the top of Group A with a 2-0 result over TYLOO fe (Inferno 16-10, Cache 16-8). These results meant that CLG Red finished top, while paiN fe were eliminated having finished third, by four rounds.
Group B featured Those Damn Canadians at play, and they took a 1-1 draw against Russia's Lazurus in the opening match (Inferno 12-16, Cache 16-13). They followed this up with a 2-0 win over the Philippines' ArkAngel Female (Dust2 16-3, Mirage 16-3) before rounding the group stage out with an eventful 1-1 draw against France (Train 5-16, Nuke 22-20). This left TDC with a 1-2-0 record and a second place finish in their group.
In tomorrow's playoffs, CLG Red and Those Damn Canadians will face off in the semifinals at 2:00 AM EDT.