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| Ivan Saldajeno |
By Ivan Saldajeno
PASAY--Wings completed a Cinderella story in the ESL One tournament in fashion, going for a 3-0 sweep of Liquid in the championship series at the Mall of Asia Arena on Sunday night.
Tagged as heavy underdogs all tournament long despite winning the Chinese qualifier, Wings made a huge surprise by bouncing back from their preliminary loss to Complexity, eventually ruling the lower bracket, up to the semis win against Fnatic and finally until the shock domination against Liquid, the lone direct invite that survived the previous rounds, in the finale.
Zhou Yang paced Wings in the opener through his Queen of Pain, scoring five straight kills 16 minutes in before leading the charge in a pivotal clash within the Roshan area late in the match.
Zhou, more known as Blink, continued his surge, even achieving a Beyond Godlike streak as Invoker in the second match to again help force Liquid to say "GG".
Facing elimination, Liquid, which entered the finals by sweeping Empire in the semis, went fast-paced in the third match as Lasse Urpalainen, Adrian Trinks, and Ivan Borislavov joined forces in erecting a 29-15 lead in kills as Spectre, Outworld Devourer, and Dark Seer respectively.
But Wings, which slowed the game later on, began their major comeback through a crucial clash win at the middle lane that led to Liquid's two lower-tier towers being quickly destroyed.
Yang, playing as Alchemist, then went berserk later on as he accomplished a Beyond Godlike streak that boosted the late rally and forced Liquid to concede.
Wings, which won a major DOTA 2 tournament for the very first time, will walk away with US$250 thousand.
Follow him on Twitter: @IvanSaldajeno
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