[GSL WC] Korea vs World Day 2 - Page 459

Clearly Korea started out with their worst players (a term I use lightly because everyone in this tournament are among the best of the best in the world) and saved July, MC, MVP, & NesTea for last. I think the idea, in part, was to have guys like anypro, MKP, & San take out the entire World Team so that they could say that they wiped them without needing any of their champions.

I also think Nada was pretty surprised that he needed to play on day one and probably wasn't quite prepared for that (although I don't think the significance of that should be overstated because most of the World team flew in shortly before the tournament and likely had little time to practice too, and Artosis mentioned that WhiteRa was jet-lagged on day 1).

It's also very likely that MC was told he'd be put in against TT1 to start the day and so I would imagine that he was practicing that matchup beforehand (MC cares about his reputation and probably imagined himself all-killing the World team). And then July, MVP, and NesTea also must have figured there was a good possibility that they were going to be used and needed to be at their best.

I was soooo impressed with WhiteRa -- he's one of those guys who's a fan favorite but I never thought he was at the same echelon of play as the top Koreans, but then he took out MC with perhaps the most brilliant anti-4 gate strategy yet seen in PvP and would have beaten July but for not realizing that he still had a good economic lead after stabilizing. I think he has a strong case for being one of the top 5 Protoss players in the world (including Korea).

And then there's Jinro -- I feel like I see him use that exact strategy (15 CC followed by a 3 rax wall) in TvZ on all of the large GSL maps (he did it twice vs. Morrow in the TSL) and that he loses with it a lot. The strategy sounds awesome in theory, but then I think the Zerg has two strong options to kill you: 1) Baneling bust all-in (a la Morrow), or 2) Quickly grab a 3rd hatch and drone like mad knowing that the terran can't pressure you.

I think Jinro was expecting July to go for the all-in baneling bust and he built a beautiful wall to crush it. Instead July droned up, got an earlier than usual Spire, and the game was effectively over well before the final battle. I think Jinro has the sickest micro & macro mechanics among the foreigners and really could have taken a few of the top Koreans out, so it was a shame that he went out without really getting to put up a fight.

I think most of the top Terrans are struggling with figuring out how to play the new maps (see: IMMvp considering changing races) because early pressure usually fails hard (watching Mvp trying to first 2-rax and then 4-rax vs. Dimaga was just funny), and going for the ultra fast CC instantly eliminates the threat of early cloaked banshee, blue flame hellion drops, or marine all-ins.