ESL One Birmingham Day 1 Results

Day 1 of ESL One Birmingham went well for a lot of teams, simply because most matches ended in a draw. But there were also huge upsets.

Xtreme Gaming, who won the trophy at Elite League just weeks ago, lost both of their matches. Gaimin Gladiators obtained just one point out of four, after drawing against Team Spirit and losing against Tundra Esports. Team Falcons, who were expected to crush everyone, drew twice, against BetBoom Esports and Shopify Rebellion.

Looking at these results, one is inclined to ask: what happened? Did the players get distracted by the English weather? Or perhaps the city itself? We rarely have Dota 2 events taking place in this country. In theory, the novelty aspect shouldn’t affect the teams. But it seems that in some cases it does.

Group A Results

Hard game #RoadToRiyadh #ESLOne pic.twitter.com/T4DxTsDbOb

— BetBoom Team (@BetBoomTeam) April 22, 2024

In group A of ESL One Birmingham, the best-performing team on day 1 was G2.iG, who defeated BetBoom and drew against Team Liquid. Their results were a bit surprising but not as surprising as those of some of the other teams, including Talon Esports.

Talon were supposed to lose every match at this tournament but on day 1, they drew against Liquid and Shopify using a combination of very tanky heroes. In the game they won against Shopify they picked Tiny, Timbersaw, Enchantress Faceless Void, and Death Prophet. All of these heroes have excellent survival mechanisms.

In the game they won against Liquid, Talon picked Dragon Knight, Sven, Mars, Phoenix, and Grimstroke. Apart from Grimstroke, every hero on this list is very difficult to kill.

Shopify Rebellion also started the tournament with two draws. In the match against Falcons, they took advantage of the fact that the MENA team competed with a stand-in. Malr1ne didn’t play and was replaced by SumaiL.

This was not a bad trade but it still disrupted Falcons’ strategy because SumaiL is not used to competing with the rest of the roster.

The situation lasted for the entire day, which is likely part of the reason why Falcons drew both matches.

For Team Liquid, both G2.iG and Talon proved to be too hard to beat. Nisha and his squad won the two games using some very interesting hero combinations. Against G2.iG, they picked Weaver, Doom, and Leshrac. Against Talon, they picked Luna, Puck, and Doom.

For BetBoom, day 1 was rough. They only obtained one point out of three and also received a level 2 draft penalty for abusing a bug.

Group B Results

Good morning 🫡 #RoadToRiyadh pic.twitter.com/rhBqnA60Kh

— OG (@OGesports) April 23, 2024

In group B of ESL One Birmingham, OG started with a victory against Xtreme Gaming. It seems that Ceb has managed to find a successful formula for his team and make much better use of power spikes.

He picked heroes like Marci, Bane, Muerta, and Invoker, whom we don’t see very often. Xtreme thought they could win by just playing standard Dota. They were wrong.

In their other match, against Tundra, OG drew after losing game 1 in 48 minutes and winning game 2 in 71. Tundra tried almost the same idea in both games but the second time, OG were prepared.

Once again, they picked heroes like Marci, Bane, and Luna. Despite losing badly in the first 30 minutes, they made a spectacular comeback and won.

At minute 30, they were 12.000 gold behind. At minute 39, they were 16.000 gold ahead. The battle still needed around 30 minutes to finalize because Tundra almost made a comeback of their own.

Tundra’s other match finished with a victory against Gaimin Gladiators. It seems that Topson and Pure~ have found their favorite heroes and tactics. In both games they picked Clockwerk and Sniper, which is supposed to be a risky combination. But because of how they played these heroes, the strategy worked much better than expected.

Game 1 lasted 42 minutes while game 2 was over after less than 30. Topson and Pure looked very happy at the end and were obviously proud of their battle plan.

For Xtreme Gaming, the defeat against OG was followed by another defeat, against HEROIC. This second defeat clearly indicates that the Chinese team is not in good shape right now.

The heroes they picked included Sniper (twice), Batrider (twice), Chen, Faceless Void, Sven, and Tusk. Game 1 was close (56 minutes) but game 2 was a stomp (28 minutes).

Gaimin Gladiators lost against Tundra and then drew against Team Spirit. The two-time TI winners drew both of their matches, using heroes like Slardar, Bane, and Leshrac.

More and more teams are starting to gravitate toward Luna again, which is indicative of how stable this hero is right now. Her ability to move and farm quickly is highly valued by many teams.

Header: ESL