EPTDreamHack Masters Summer: Season Finals
by PoopiThe Summer Season Finals has already gotten off to a chaotic start, with the high-flying Trap crashing out in Group A. Will there be any more upsets in Groups C & D, or will the favorites be able to hold their ground?
Group C Preview: Rogue, INnoVation, SpeCial, Nice
Start time: Friday, Jul 02 2:00pm GMT (GMT+00:00)Up until a week ago, Rogue and INnoVation seemed like clear favorites to advance from Group C. Rogue came in as the reigning Code S champion, having won Season 1 with a dominating 4-1 victory over Maru in the finals. As for INnoVation, despite an overall decline, he had still shown uncanny consistency in reaching the RO8 of major tournaments. While SpeCial and Nice’s skills with prepared builds certainly had to be respected, they seemed doomed to suffer the fate of most ‘minor’ region representatives.
However the results from the first week of Code S Season 2 games have complicated things a bit. Rogue only advanced in second place from a supposedly easy group of his making, losing straight-up to Bunny and even dropping a map to GSL rookie Percival. Meanwhile, in another GSL group, INnoVation was eliminated in last place, failing to win a single map against either Dark or DongRaeGu. Code S is a notoriously difficult competition, and a bad day of games is hardly the final word on anyone’s form. But, for now, it does cast some doubt on our two favorites. On the flipside, perhaps the underdogs in the group have a better chance than most expect?
Well, maybe we still have to be a bit conservative about Nice. The Taiwanese Protoss is cementing his domination over the Taiwan/Hong Kong/Macau/Japan region, deposing Has to win three regional championships in a row. Unfortunately for him, he’s still the underdog against every opponent in this group—even if INnoVation and Rogue are going through a rough patch of form. In 2021, Nice has gone 0-1 against INnoVation (0-2 map score), 0-2 against Rogue (1-4 map score), and 1-4 against SpeCial (3-8 map score). Not only does he have a negative record against every player in his group, he is not even in the first page of Aligulac rankings, sitting more than 400 points behind SpeCial at #65th place in the standings at the time of writing. Even given the unpredictable nature of BO3—who would have thought Scarlett would advance ahead of Trap in Group A?—Nice is facing an uphill battle with Aligulac’s predictive formula giving him a less than 10% chance of advancing.
The story is different for SpeCial. He’s far less of an underdog than Nice in this group, and I would even go as far as saying that he is even the 2nd favorite to advance. Sure, INnoVation has a far greater resume and name value, and usually manages to pass group stages regardless of his form, but there are a lot of things going SpeCial’s way. First and foremost, he won their latest encounter a bit more than a month ago in GSL Super Tournament 2, in which the Mexican Terran scored an impressive 3-2 upset over The Machine. If he can beat INnoVation in an offline BO5 series, then he can probably do the same in an online BO3 environment.
Momentum is also in favor of SpeCial. He might be facing a difficult Code S group as the underdog, but he has yet to play his games. On the other hand, INnoVation got eliminated from his beatable Code S group in disappointing fashion, not even winning a single map. Finally, this Code S elimination might be a consequence of INnoVation not practicing much nowadays—at least according to teasing from his fellow pros during the group selection. Not only could SpeCial win their rematch, but he may even beat him harder than during the GSL Super Tournament.
I expect SpeCial to beat INnoVation in their first encounter, while Rogue versus Nice will probably be a formality for the highest earning player of StarCraft 2. Rogue will probably be hoping for these predictions to come true, because although he beat INnoVation recently in an Alpha X showmatch, he was on a six match losing streak against INnoVation prior to that. On the other hand, Rogue has dominated SpeCial throughout his career, so the outlook could be radically different for him depending on how the TvT goes.
I don’t see Nice pulling an upset in a potential match against INnoVation at all, regardless of the Terran’s poor form, and thus the decider’s match could be another TvT battle between SpeCial and INnoVation. Although I am a firm believer in the rematch curse (with momentum playing a huge role in this), the poor performance of INnoVation in GSL as well as his defeat to the hands of SpeCial in Super Tournament, convince me that the latter will prevail once again. Of course, you always have to factor in how hard Rogue is trying, and his generally disappointing performances in international online tournaments. Still, if these matches go as I expect, that shouldn't factor in until the next round.
Predictions:
Rogue > Nice
INnoVation < SpeCial
Rogue > SpeCial
INnoVation > Nice
SpeCial > INnoVation
Rogue and SpeCial to advance.
Group D Preview: Clem, Neeb, TIME, HeroMarine
Start time: Thursday, Jul 01 2:00pm GMT (GMT+00:00)Clem is still sitting on top of the Aligulac.com standings in spite of his string of disappointing results at NeXT Season 1 and TSL7, which speaks volumes about how high the young French Terran peaked. He became the clear #1 player in European competition after winning two straight regional titles with dominating wins over Serral and Reynor. Paradoxically, that does NOT make him the best European player, due to his international struggles against top-tier Protosses and Terrans.
After winning DHM Europe by beating the IEM world champion Reynor by both 3-2 and 4-1 (1 map winners bracket advantage) scores, Clem was on top of the world. But all of the sudden, he wasn’t, because Starcraft 2 is a cutthroat and cruel game. A 1-2 defeat to MaxPax in EPT Cup #75 was a reminder that he isn’t as untouchable in TvP as he is in TvZ, but not that worrying. That was followed by a surprising yet not totally unexpected 2-3 loss to Cure in the TSL7 upper bracket. Then a 2-4 loss to Dark followed in the TSL lower bracket, in the match-up everyone thought he had completely figured out. A 0-3 loss to Maru in NeXT Season 1 was another painful blow, even when softened by the sheer TvT strength of his opponent. Clem’s 0-2 loss to Lilbow in EPT Cup #76 was another damning loss. Sure, the stakes weren’t high, but a top Terran like Clem wasn’t ever supposed to lose to a once-retired, returning pro. Clem has invited much doubt upon himself, but perhaps the Summer Finals will be the perfect opportunity for him to show that he has the mental fortitude to overcome this string of defeats.
While this group doesn’t have any top Koreans, it does have a number of formidable Protosses and Terrans for Clem to face. That makes it the hardest one to predict in my opinion. I could see any combination of two players getting out alive from Group D, and I fully expect the competition to be brutal.
The specific match-up draws have gone against Clem. His match against HeroMarine is a worst case scenario in this group. Indeed, Big Gabe actually has a better record against Clem than either Serral or Reynor in 2021, being closely matched at 7-8 in head-to-head matches.
Of course, we can’t talk about Clem vs HeroMarine without bringing up their history in the EPT Open cups. The European Server Cup has been the site of numberous battles between the two European Terrans, and overall they’ve been the two dominant forces in the competition. Clem barely edges out his German rival with 12 match wins and 10 losses in EU Cup competition, but HeroMarine gained the upper hand in their past couple of meetings. HeroMarine struck down Clem in both Open Cups #77 (this week) and #72 (back in May), but Clem did defeat HeroMarine 3-1 in their more consequential DHM Europe match—perhaps a reassuring sign to Clem fans who hope he’ll pull through in this important duel.
As for HeroMarine, he has his own nemesis in TIME. His Aligulac TvT rating might be higher, but he has a poor head-to-head record of 2-9 in matches against the Chinese Terran. Also, Big Gabe said multiple times after these defeats that he struggles a lot in cross-server matches. While that’s a common refrain from players in this mostly-online era, there might be some truth to it affecting HeroMarine more (even if only psychologically). While I’m not sure if HeroMarine can overcome TIME, he could still qualify by beating Clem and Neeb. He’s closely matched with Neeb at 7-6 in matches all-time, though he did have the EU Cup server advantage in many of those meetings.
Back to TIME. The Chinese Terran, in my opinion, is the clear favorite against HeroMarine, but it’s hard to know exactly where he stands against everyone else. His 3-0 of HeroMarine in TSL7 was a rare glimpse of his ability against European competitors, because we don’t see him much outside of international tournaments. Of course, TIME has been the king of the Chinese regional scene since he rose to fame, winning every EPT regional since ESL took over the scene. However, he hasn’t completely dominated, being taken to full-set series even getting thrust down to the losers’ bracket on occasion. He barely won 4-3 against the unheralded Jieshi (though WTL fans might rate him higher) in the latest Chinese finals, and that was with a 1 map winners bracket advantage. While that match was a month ago, it’s still worrying for his match against Neeb. His head-to-head records against both Clem and Neeb have a very small sample size and the games were played two years ago, so they’re not relevant at all. Ultimately, I have to hold TIME’s struggles against Jieshi against him, especially considering Neeb’s monstrous record in competitive PvT matches.
Indeed, Neeb has aa scary 21-1 match record in 2021 PvTs, with a 45-8 record in maps. Neeb has probably forgot what it felt like to lose versus Terran during a tournament, since it happened more than 6 months ago in EPT Cup #52. Incidentally, the Terran who handed him that sole loss was none other than HeroMarine! Certainly, an observant fan would note that most of Neeb’s wins were against relatively weak opponents and mostly in small online cups. However, there is still a nice 2-0 victory over Cure during IEM Katowice 2021 group stage, and a solid 4-4 map record against the 4th best European player HeroMarine to his credit. Neeb also didn’t lose a single TvP map in his last ten matches—playing against solid Terrans like uThermal, Kelazhur, Epic and Future—so he sure does have momentum on his side. It’s at least enough to make me confident that he will beat TIME relatively easily.
With so few clear favorites, this group could end up playing out in a lot different ways. Ultimately, I’ve decided to predict a scenario where HeroMarine and Clem advance, despite facing off in the first match.
Predictions:
Clem < HeroMarine
Neeb > TIME
HeroMarine > Neeb
Clem > TIME
Clem > Neeb
HeroMarine and Clem to advance.
