Team Secret - the clear favorites
Built with the sole purpose of winning all major tournaments and dominating the professional Dota 2 scene, Team Secret is fulfilling their goal as they are currently ranked 1st world-wide. With a cast of hand-picked Dota 2 personalities, this team is also one of the most experienced with the signature ESL One single elimination format as all the team members have attended both ESL One events in 2014.
There is no other organization present at this edition of ESL One who can boast with three LAN trophies obtained in the last month (Red Bull Battle Grounds, The Summit 3, MarsTV). Stomping their opponents almost every time they compete, many of their games don’t even reach the 30 minute mark, testament to this should be the 14 minutes victory over Evil Geniuses in the Summit 3 grand finals.
Their 15-0 run at DAC 2015 is a strong indication that the Chinese teams are not an unknown factor for Team Secret, which makes them the biggest hope for the western scene to put an end to the Chinese streak of titles at ESL One.
Roster:
Clement “Puppey” Ivanov
Kuro “KuroKy” Salehi Takhasomi
Ludwig “zai” Wåhlberg
Gustav “s4” Magnusson
Artour “Arteezy” Babaev
The Chinese power house - Vici Gaming
It’s for the third time when Vici Gaming is competing in ESL One tournaments and they are the champions from last year’s edition in New York. Although they were competing with Black^ at that time, they swapped him for the TI Champion, Hao and now they look even stronger. As shown yesterday in the Seeding Bracket mini event nobody wants to take the chance of playing against them in their first match for the main event as they were not picked by any of the captains representing the first three seeded teams.
The unwritten rule that says Western teams are winning Asian tournaments while Chinese are stomping in West seems to be confirmed perfectly by Vici Gaming who did not mage to win neither DAC nor Mars.TV this year but they crushed everyone at DreamHack Bucharest two months ago. In the post event interviews made by DotaBlast and Fragbite with iceiceice he was not afraid to call out the western teams as “lazy and really bad”.
Having one of the best supporting duo in the world in Fenrir and fy (god) and an ofllaner with a wide hero pool, Vici Gaming has always been a strong contender for everyone and despite their 5/6 seed position from yesterday they are most certainly capable to defend their ESL One title.
Roster:
Lu “Fenrir” Chao
Xu “fy” Linsen
Daryl “iceiceice” Koh Pei Xiang
Xie “Super” Junhao
Chen “Hao” Zhihao
Evil Geniuses - third time's a charm
The North American DotA 2 pride, Evil Geniuses, are the ones who raised a red flag for the Chinese this year when they took home the Radiance trophy at DotA 2 Asia Championships in Shanghai. Being one of the dominant teams in the competitive scene and having a bunch of titles under their belt they still miss the ESL One champions tag. Two times in a row they finished runners up as Invictus Gaming and Vici Gaming snatched the trophy from them.
Coming this time around with a new roster that includes the youngster talent Suma1L who is also a debutant on Commerzbank Arena, Evil Geniuses look ready to claim the eluding title. Not only that they have the chance to settle the score with the ESL One Champions IG (Frankfurt 2014) and VG (New York 2014) but they are also seeking revenge against Team Secret who recently defeated them in The Summit 3 grand finals.
The mix between one of the most experienced players in the competitive DotA scene, “The Old Man” Clinton "Fear" Loomis and the talented youngster Syed Sumail “Suma1L” Hassan transformed EG into a beautiful story of two generations and opened new drafting strategies for their captain ppd. Having one of the best offlane players in the world, namely UNiVeRsE, the new line-up of Evil Geniuses’s strength resides in their play - making potential.
Roster:
Peter “ppd” Dager
Kurtis “Aui_2000” Ling
Saahil “UNiVeRsE” Arora
Syed “Suma1L” Sumail Hassan
Clinton “Fear” Loomis
Fnatic – “Our target for ESL is top 4”
Fnatic have always had a special place in the European’s fans heats, regardless of which team was dominant in the scene, due to their charismatic squad. The dissolution of their DotA 2 team in the post TI4 shuffle was surrounded by a lot of drama and had many fans hang their Fnatic hoodies in the closets.
But Fnatic’s absence on the Dota 2 scene ended last month when they announced their comeback in the form of their first non-European squad, namely former Team Malaysia. A truly bold move for the western organization, obviously motivated by the undisputed value of the roster lead by Mushi who are undoubtedly worthy to fight under the Fnatic banner. They made their debut two weeks ago in Austin Texas at jD-MLG Pro League where they finished on an honorable third place.
Although Mushi was hoping for a better result in Austin, in his recent interview for GosuGamers he stated that their goal for ESL One is top 4. Nonetheless, they are strong contenders, having the Dota legend Mushi back in his MVP solo mid position and a very experienced kYxY, Fnatic should be the team capable to cause the upsets this weekend on Commerzbank Arena.
Roster:
Siong “JoHnNy” Tait Lee
Fadil “Kecik Imba” bin Mohd Raziff
Chong “Ohaiyo” Xin Khoo
Chai “Mushi” Yee Fung
Lee “kYxY” Kang Yang
Virtus.Pro - “Our goal is definitely a victory”
The curse of visa problems has always haunted Virtus.Pro and it lead to them not attending many major or premier LAN events, which means they didn’t exactly got the chance to face the strong contenders for this year’s International, although they got a direct invite to the most wanted tournament of the year. Once they sorted out their passports and managed to step outside the Russian borders they’ve shown a fearless and unstoppable snowballing power, showcasing the well-known aggressive CIS Dota.
Their recent performance at Dream League 3 and yesterday’s performance in the seeding bracket event should raise some concerns for the top teams like Secret, EG or VG.
Asked by the ESL One staff right after they won the qualifiers round by defeating both main favorites Vici Gaming and Team Secret, what is their goal for the main event, the answer was “Our goal is definitely a victory”, which may sound cheeky but taking into account their recent ascending trend, they do stand a chance to win it all.
Roster:
Ilya “Illidan” Pivcaev
Sergey “G” Bragin
Alexander “DkPhobos” Kucheria
Ilya “Lil” Ilyuk
Artem “fng” Barshak
Cloud 9 - eternally second
Cloud 9 can be easily described as one of the most spectacular teams in the scene, their path in tournaments always being marked by intense games, sick plays and impressive comebacks. However, they are yet to win a LAN title since they reformed half a year ago.
Regardless their rankings, Cloud 9 is the team that no one is keen on facing given their capability to exhaust their opponents in drawn-out games. Beside the fact that they are the protagonists of the most exciting and memorable game from last year in Commerzbank Arena they also hold the record for the longest DotA 2 game in history, record made in March this year vs SFZ, when the clock stopped at 3:20:34. Yes, over three hours!
Labeled as the forever second place finishers, much like the former Fnatic team, Cloud 9 need to break the stereotype and prove to the world they have what it takes to become champions and ESL One is the perfect opportunity to do just that.
Roster:
Johan “BigDaddy” Sundstein
Rasmus “MiSeRy” Filipsen
Pittner “bOne7” Armand
Adrian “FATA-” Trinks
Jacky “EternaLEnVy” Mao
Invictus Gaming – in Burning they trust
Frankfurt holds pleasant memories for Invictus Gaming and this tournament is the last chance for them to rectify their record of achievements for this year. After their placed second at StarLadder XII two months ago and their very good third position from yesterday’s seeding bracket, the Chinese champions can hope to write history again at the Commerzbank Arena.
IG struggled to find stability and achieve decent results after they lost their captain YYF in the post TI4 shuffle. But all the rainy days seem to be over now that they have the legendary Burning on their side.
With their new roster being very close to the one they had when they won The International 2 and with King J on the coaching bench for them, Invictus Gaming look like they are ready to bounce back at ESL One Frankfurt. Their understandable Cloud 9 pick, given the options they were left with, for their first game in the main event could bring us a farming battle between EnVy and Burning and who knows, maybe a breathtaking base race as both teams often end their games in a dramatic fashion.
Roster:
Xu “BurNIng” Zhilei
Luo “Ferrari_430” Feichi
Luo “Luo” Yinqi
Wong ”ChuaN” Hock Chuan
Zeng “Faith” Hongda
Alliance the unlikely underdogs
foto credit: Helena Kristiansson
Alliance had a rough year and their sinuous path is well known to everyone as the team’s ups and downs have been under the spotlight of every Dota 2 news outlet. Returning now to the Commerzbank Arena, after a poor showing at The International 5 qualifiers, Alliance is facing a make or brake moment as a poor result here might be the last straw.
Despite the buffs received in 6.84 on Nature’s Prophet and Lone Druid, AdmirallBuldog’s signature heroes, 7ckngMad’s drafting puts more emphasis on strong team-fights with cores like Leshrac, Phoenix, Beastmaster, Queen of Pain and Shadow Fiend. The French-Swedish affair that Alliance is living these days produced some results, the most recent being the runner-up spot in Austin, Texas, at the joinDOTA MLG Pro League.
If there is an unforgettable match in ESL One’s history that should be the one in which the Swedes faced Cloud 9 and stole the show in an one hour long battle of incredibly tense and exciting r[A]t DotA that raised the stadium in standing ovations. However, for this tournament they are to be regarded as the underdogs who can certainly produce upsets but have no real chance at the title.
Alliance is the only team in Frankfurt that hasn’t qualified for The International and also the only former TI champions to miss the main event of the year. ESL One is the final tournament of this competitive year for them so they should make the most out of it.
Roster:
Sebastien “7ckngMad” Debs
Joakim “Akke” Akterhall
Henrik “AdmiralBulldog” Ahnberg
Per “Pajkatt” Anders Olsson Lille
Jonathan “Loda” Berg
More content on GosuGamers
