Nigma Only Needs One More Win to Secure a Direct Invite to TI 10

Nigma is very close to securing a top 12 spot in the Dota Pro Circuit and a victory in its next Upper Bracket match at WePlay AniMajor would be sufficient.

WePlay AniMajor Recent Results

The Playoffs of WePlay AniMajor started with 3 predictable results and one upset. Nigma smashed Virtus.pro, PSG.LGD had no problems against Alliance, T1 caused a huge upset against Aster, and Quincy Crew eventually won against NoPing e-sports with a score of 2 – 1.

In the Lower Bracket, Vici Gaming defeated Virtus.pro, Team Spirit eliminated Alliance, TNC caused yet another upset by defeating Aster, and Evil Geniuses managed to beat NoPing e-sports. All of these 4 matches ended with a score of 2 – 1. By comparison, the first 3 Upper Bracket matches were extremely one-sided and ended with a score of 2 – 0.

In Vici Gaming’s case, the victory they got over Virtus.pro has helped them to secure a spot at TI 10. The Chinese squad is thriving in the Lower Bracket and is currently the 8^th ranked team globally. I’m not entirely sure what will happen if multiple teams finish with the same number of points and are fighting for the last few qualification spots.

Right now, no less than 5 contestants have 800 points and are ranked 8^th – 12^th. If Nigma manages to finish in the top 4 at WePlay AniMajor, this would mean that all of these teams now have to play a tiebreaker in order to determine which one of them will not get the direct invite. Another option would be for Valve to simply give the direct invitation to 13 teams instead of 12, but I don’t see that happening.

Upcoming Matches

The next 4 matches will result in 2 teams being eliminated and another 2 teams securing a top 3 result at WePlay AniMajor.

Team Nigma – PSG.LGD

This is going to be a very hard match for Nigma. The two teams drew in the Group Stage but the overall battle was won by PSG.LGD. In the Playoffs, both competitors had an easy time against their first rival. Nigma won against VP while PSG.LGD defeated Alliance.

The score here should be 2 – 1 or 1 – 2. Anyone could win but I don’t believe for a second that either Nigma or LGD can win without losing a single game against such a strong opponent.

T1 – Quincy Crew

Based on what T1 has done so far, I think you should regard them as the favorite in this match. The closer we get to TI 10, the better 23savage seems to play. The 19-year-old is quickly becoming the world’s best position 1 / 2 player.

If T1 succeeds here, this would be a huge victory for the organization that used to rule League of Legends until just 3 years ago. It could also mark a historic moment. Because so far, no Dota 2 Major or TI winner team has done something equivalent in League of Legends. And vice versa. The one that got the closest to this performance was Fnatic.

Vici Gaming – Team Spirit

Vici Gaming is the clear favorite here. As much as I would like the CIS team to win, a victory against the competitor that defeated their regional nemesis, Virtus.pro, in their last match, is quite unlikely.

TNC Predator – Evil Geniuses

In theory, this is the most balanced match of the 4. It wouldn’t be if Evil Geniuses were in great shape. But as the Group Stage proved, they’re not. At the same time, TNC is playing really well right now and could easily produce a spectacular result. The only problem, however, is that they lost their confrontation against EG in the round-robin. Overall, I’d put the score here at 1 – 2 in favor of the North American team.

 

Photo credit: Valve