Games of the week
MVP vs Tefel @ Planet S
Fourteen minutes into the game, Mvp finds himself down fifty supply, more workers than anybody is willing to admit and to one mining base. All of that, on the back of a 3-base roach play, a strategy that has broken many acclaimed Terrans in the past.
But Mvp is different. Coated in so many (too many, even) StarCraft 2 games, he sits in his base, knowing that his opponent's smaller experience in playing such grand names might play him a bad joke. And it does. The roaches keep coming but no transition follows from Tefel and against all odds and against all numbers, Mvp lives to deliver a stunning upset, switching around a 100 supply deficit.
Shuttle vs Slivko @ Star Station
Starting at 42:00 minutes, Shuttle and Slivko engage in the second mind-boggling ZvT for the week. Drops and counter attacks, widow mine explosions, a back and forth tug-of-war? and the brood lord/infetor power of the Zerg are all poured into this almost 50-minute game which decides who lives and who dies in the series.
[Group A] Mvp 2:0 Elfi: A straightforward TvP which sees Elfi suffer crushing damages both from drops and from direct confrontations. - VOD
[Group A] Tefel 2:0 Beastyqt: Tefel's level of macro is not to Beastyqt's liking and the Terran is overwhelmed by not entirely diverse army of roaches and infestors (game one) and hydras and lings (game two). - VOD
[Group A] Elfi 2:1 Beastyqt: Beastyqt takes an early lead with a bio/tank push but Elfi springs back by outmacroing the Terran on Star Station and bringing along a proxy oracle into punching attack in game three. - VOD
[Group A] Tefel 2:1 Elfi: A cute (and massive) zealot raid leaves Tefel without a hatchery and a game down. To His luck, massing on stuff and parading over Protoss' dead body is still a viable strategy these days. - VOD
[Group B] Stephano 2:1 Slivko: Having more roaches is way better than not. Same goes for better upgraded roaches as well. - VOD
[Group B] MC 2:1 Shuttle: An EMP blast by Shuttle finds the clustered army of MC to give the Terran game one. Boss Toss gets angry, tie-kills Shuttle with a 3-gate/oracle and humiliates his proxy widow mine before crushing his bio push. - VOD
[Group B] Stephano 2:0 MC: The turtly Stephano of HotS meets the aggressive Stephano of WoL and MC is treated to swarm hosts galore and +1 roach/hydra timings. - VOD
[Group B] MC 2:0 Slivko: Put against the ropes and in a win-or-go-home scenario, MC does what he does best. Make an army of either colossi or stalker/sentry, transport it to Zerg's base and beat him till he cries for mercy. - VOD
Group C, July 2nd, 18:00 CET
TLO vs Mana - The German powerhouse looks forward to the start of his WCS Season 2 run by playing Poland's finest Protoss MaNa. The Zerg in blue has been on a constant rise of performance - reaching recently a top 3 at HSC 7 - and his every match-up looks strong enough to beat everybody. At the same time, MaNa has dropped to a lower level than what we're used to see from him so this looks like something that TLO might take home.
MMA vs Tails - Tails is notoriously subpar in TvP and so this particular match-up doesn't look too good for him. MMA hasn't lost a BoX to a Protoss since early May and he's killed Socke, Mana, Alicia and Sage along the way. Although he might not be on the same level as before, MMA definitely looks like the favorite here.
Group D, July 3rd, 18:00 CET
DIMAGA vs duckdeok - It's not often that a Korean is not the favored in a match-up agaisnt a foreigner but most bets should go to Dimaga here. Duckdeok (previously known as finale) made it to premier league after really a lot of struggles against local opposition and the only thing that will be working for him is his stunning 72% win rate in PvZ.
Dayshi vs HasuObs - Somewhat surprisingly, Dayshi has not yet arrived at the level which everyone is expecting. The French Terran has been playing astonishingly in team leagues but not so much in individual ones. A top 16 at DreamHack Summer is where he peaked after being ousted in Ro32 of last WCS Europe and now he has to prove himself yet again before the community starts little by little forgetting his name. He still managed to beat HasuObs in challenger league, though, so there's definitely the chance that the German veteran starts the group one win short.
Rotator photo: ESL
