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I enjoyed the Broodmother pick despite the lack of success it had. Honestly I’m not super surprised to see TNC Pro Team pick something like Broodmother. They figured a curveball could allow them take a game off LGD.Forever Young. LGD.Forever Young swept TNC Pro Team 2-0, nothing really special to see here. Let’s break down the series;
Pre-Match Predictions
LGD.Forever Young had a fantastic Group Stage, going 14-2. Their only 2 losses came in series that they split, which makes that record in more impressive. TNC Pro Team were extremely uneven throughout the Group Stage and only manages a 9-7 record. I personally expected TNC Pro to get swept, they never gave me the impression that they wanted to Win. Realistically they never looked like they could win at TI7 at any point this year. Theres still a lot of money on the line and pride has to come into play as well. LGD.Forever Young came to the Main Event with something to prove.
Game One; Alchemist Almost Carried
I’m not a huge fan of Nightstalker support, especially when that team leaves up Lycan. There’s nothing wrong with Naga Siren & Jakiro being picked early; but it did cause me to question what process TNC took to get here. Evil Geniuses picked Lycan in their first game of TI7, but I suppose TNC forgot about that loss. Nothing really notable happened in the draft until the last pick Alchemist. Alchemist can and has worked at TI7 but this draft did Alchemist no favors. TNC didn’t draft any Heroes that could push well let alone keep Nature’s Prophet in check. Despite this game going for over one hour in length it was clear early in that this game was Alchemist against the world. LGD.Forever Young whether’d the storm from Alchemist until Terrorblade finally scaled.
Game Two; Goodbye TNC
TNC had a fairly solid draft in game two. The Naga Siren Pick was a good pick for reseting fights after a Siren Song disengage. I was happy to see Broodmother but after seeing the game play out I don’t like it at all. I don’t like Oracle being picked before Sand King, Oracle cannot flex into anything but Support. Oracle and Naga Siren are not a good combination for supporting a team. Broodmother now feels like a pick TNC Pro felt forced to make once they got backed into a corner. I like LGD’s draft, Kunkka is a great support pick when your team is ahead, LGD knew they would be the team to set the pace of this game. Bristleback was a great pick after Broodmother, he’s got enough of aoe damage to keep spiderlings in check. TNC Pro had a minute or two where it looked like they might be able to get into this game. Those feelings were short-lived.
LGD.Forever Young (2) vs TNC Pro Team (0); Now What?
The first half of my prophecy came true, TNC got swept out of the Upper Bracket. Part two begins tomorrow when TNC Pro face OG. TNC are the heavy underdogs going into that match and I don’t expect TNC to put up much of a fight. Even if they did win, TNC would face the winner from Team Liquid v Team Secret. I doubt they could beat either of those teams in a best-of-three. Enough about TNC, LGD.Forever Young have promise. LGD.FY played well today and they will need to play even if they want to win their next Upper Bracket match. If they were to lose that, any of their potential Lower Bracket opponents look just as difficult. LGD.FY have an uphill battle ahead but they could surprise people from this point out.
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Upper Bracket Recap; TNC Pro Team vs LGD.Forever Young