Week #22 of the ESL Open Cups featured HeroMarine breaking another record, as he was able to become the first player worldwide to reach the milestone of ten victories in the weeklies. In Korea, Zest claimed his fifth win, continuing the dominance of top Protoss players in that region's cups. Finally, PartinG finally returned to the top spot in the American Open, almost ten weeks after his last victorious run.
Zest has been a very consistent performer in the Korean ESL Open Cups, but in the last weeks PvP has been his bane with his fellow top Protoss players Stats and Trap eliminating him in the mirror match-up. This week, his two peers were absent, enabling Zest to avoid a high-variance PvP clash. Still, danger came from unexpected places, as GogojOey and DongRaeGu both stole map off of Zest. On the other side of the bracket, Scarlett had a perfect run into the finals, cruising there without dropping a map on the back of her ZvT to once again meet Zest. Scarlett had become a bit of a thorn in the side of Zest in the ESL Cups, eliminating him immediately after his triumph at IEM Katowice, and once again a few weeks ago. This time, however, Zest gave a much better account of himself, ending Scarlett's perfect run with his own flawless 3-0 victory in the finals.
For the fourth time in the ESL Open Cups EU, HeroMarine and ShoWTimE ended up clashing in the finals, with the Terran ultimately claiming his tenth overall victory in the tournament series. With both Big Gabe and die Mauer being so consistent (you have to go back all the way to Cup #15 to find a finals without either of them), the final pairing was perhaps the least surprising result of the tournament (especially with Reynor's absence). Much more notable was the defeat of Clem at the hands of his countryman Denver, whose run into the semi-finals proved that his appearance in the finals last week was not only due to the seeding chaos. While the Frenchman could not overcome ShoWTimE, his wins over Lambo and Clem show that he may become a more frequent sight in the EU final four.
You can tell that it wasn't a good week for Clem by taking a look at the AM ESL Open Cup results. Though his usual routine of playing both EU and AM nets him a good result in at least one of the cups, this time around he was eliminated early in the AM cup as well. Instead, PartinG, another regular of the AM Cups and a frequent opponent of the young Frenchman, used the opportunity and secured himself another victory after having failed to do so ever since the 13th edition. Most notably, he took revenge against MaNa for upsetting him in TSL5, this time winning by a narrow 3-2 scoreline. That ended up being the closest Match PartinG would play, as he clinched his Cup win with a 3-0 sweep against Cham in the finals.
ESL Open Cup winners earn $200 in prize money and 10 ESL Pro Tour points. Players who finish second earn 5 ESL Pro Tour points and $100. A top 4 finish guarantees at least $50. Week #23 of ESL Open Cups is set to take place on June 15th.
Scarlett had a perfect run into the finals, cruising there without dropping a map on the back of her ZvT to once again meet Zest
Also her TvP.
Oh, did she switch up races again? :D Edit: Ah, both Scarlett and SpeCial played off race lol
Yeah, but unfortunately the TvP between Special and Scarlett wasn't particularly entertaining.
best thing about it was how Wardi complained about it in the beginning It was still fun though.. Nothing insanly crazy, but still good enough for the memes