Week 6 Recap
Big five pull away at the top
Race for final two playoff spots heats up?

Week 7 Preview
Serral returns for big match vs TL
Twisted Fairy tested by PSISTORM

Bracket and standings on Liquipedia

World Team League - 2024 Summer Season

by: Nakajin

The start-stop summer season of the WTL is back after another break (this time for HomeStory Cup), just past the halfway point of the regular season. The playoff picture is starting to come into focus with five teams looking to already have one foot in the postseason, while the final two slots are still very much up for grabs.

This week's feature match sees TL and BASILISK face off, with the rare surprise of Serral showing up for a Friday bout. If this means Serral is going to be competing more often going forward, then 5th place BASILISK still have a chance to finish with a top two seed. Also, Twisted Fairy and PSISTORM are set to clash in a crucial mid-table bout. If Classic and Stats can't lead their team to victory here, TF will have to make one hell of a late-season rally to reach the playoffs.

In a roster update, it appears that Coffee is not leaving the WTL after signing with All Gamers a couple of weeks ago (another EWC related signing). All Gamers and Mystery Gaming have entered into an alliance for the WTL, which will allow Coffee to keep being a key contributor for this season's most resilient underdog team. The partnership also gives us the funniest team acronym in the WTL, "MYGAG."

Finally, in a scheduling update, there was an unexpected shuffling of matchdays due to the GSL playoffs on Saturday. This week's games will be played on Thursday, Friday, and Sunday (Thursday's games will already have been played by the time this article is posted).

Week 6 Recap

Top 7 teams qualify for the playoffs.
Bottom 2 teams must requalify.
Points are awarded as follows:

• 3 points for a victory in a series that does not require an ace match
  
• 2 points for a victory in a series that requires an ace-match
  
• 1 point for a loss in a series that requires an ace-match
  
• 0 points for a loss in a series that does not require an ace match

OFFSYDE Gaming 2 - 4 BASILISK
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OFFSYDE gaming put up a respectable fight against BASILISK, but ultimately couldn't earn any points for their strong effort.

Rex and Reynor started the series off, and Reynor took game one as expected in a fairly conventional game. However, Rex almost resurrected the 50/50 man in game two, launching a hilarious, map-specific Spine Crawler rush on Post-Youth (using Drones to mine out his opponent's mineral wall). While Rex caught Reynor off guard and managed to plant four Spine Crawlers in the enemy main, Reynor made the smart decision to counterattack with all his Drones and Zerglings to force a basetrade. It came down to a pure elimination race, with Reynor having barely enough minerals to build an extractor in Rex's main. As the Creep in Reynor's main receded, Rex was forced to unroot his Spines, making the game unwinnable. It was a failed effort for Rex, but definitely a match to study for any Zerg looking to sin against their kin on the ladder.

Firefly and pre-HSC ShoWTimE were up next, and they also demonstrated the quirks of Post-Youth in their first game. ShoWTimE went for a full-wall at his ramp, which Firefly responded to by taking an offensive Assimilator to mine through the mineral wall. This helped Firefly scout his opponent's Stargate tech, and also place an offensive Pylon to delay the natural. All this had a snowballing effect, with Firefly able to get his natural expansion running faster while taking minimal damage from ShoWTimE's Stargate units. This, in turn, was converted into a Stalker-count advantage for Firefly, which he used to win the game through aggressive attacks. Firefly then tied the series 2-2 with a meta-standard game on Site Delta, getting the better of ShoWTimE in a drawn-out Stalker-Chargelot war.

OFFSYDE looked to be in a surprisingly decent position with uThermal and trigger as the final runners, but trigger came through with a key 2-0 victory for BASILISK. uThermal took an early-game lead with Banshee harass on Ghost River, setting up a dangerous 1/1 timing with bio and tanks in the mid-game. However, Trigger was on point on defense, shutting down uThermal's multi-prong attacks to take the GG (in hindsight, uThermal may have been better off consolidating his forces for a frontal attack). uThermal switched to cheese mode in game two, walling his ramp quickly to go for a 1-base Marine-Tank all-in. However, Trigger's defensive micro was just good enough to pull off a tight hold, giving BASILISK their much-needed 3 points.


Platinum Heroes + R8 6 - 0 Berserker eSports
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In my preview, I was vain enough to imagine myself having mastery over the TL writers jinxing power, and tried to send Berserker some positive energy. However, the StarCraft II gods punished my mortal hubris and handed Berserker a 0-6 shutout loss instead.

YoungYakov got the ball rolling against GungFuBanDa with a Ravager-Ling-Queen push on Post-Youth, and then managed to overcome GFBD in a drawn-out game on Oceanborn.

Kelazhur kept the good times rolling for PSISTORM against DnS. The Berserker Protoss lost game 1 in somewhat infuriating fashion, as he came within a single Stalker of denying a Hellion drop that did game-ending damage. The second game was much closer, with the two players fighting evenly for several minutes. However, Kelazhur made a timely Liberator transition that swung the balance of power, giving PSISTORM the victory while also prompting Kelazhur to perform the Macarena for some reason.

Goblin made sure PSISTORM got ALL the map points on the day, breaking BattleB with a mass-Gateway style on Ghost River (a hectic and very enjoyable game) and then finishing the job with Blink Stalkers on Oceanborn.


Team Liquid 4 - 2 Mystery Gaming
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Third place TeamLiquid took advantage of Coffee's temporary absence to get the victory against Mystery Gaming.

MYG got the first points on the board, thanks to Strange stonewalling MaNa's Blink-Stalker tactics on Post-Youth. However, MaNa then equalized on Golderaura, thanks to his quicker addition of Archons to his Zealot-Stalker-Immortal army.

Elazer proceed to put Liquid up 2-1 after comfortably defending against Lemon's 7-Gate all-in on Alcyone, but the Taiwanese Protoss gave a much better showing in game two where he played a more macro-oriented style. Storms blanketed Elazer's waves of Hydra-Ling-Bane, and eventually Lemon warped in the Carriers that forced the tying GG.

Still, Liquid had quite the ace in the hole in the form of Clem, and the French Terran was clinical in the deciding series against Cyan. While Cyan had been punching above his weight class in this season of the WTL, he couldn't stand up to a super-heavyweight like Clem and lost in two straightforward games.


Vitality 5 - 1 Twisted Fairy
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The Classic and Stats-led Twisted Fairy looked like one of the more intriguing teams at the start of the season, but they were forced to take their lumps against Vitality like any other team in the league.

Solar set the tone by sweeping Stats in the opening frame. In game 1, he disrupted his opponent's Glaive-Adepts strategy with an off-tempo Ling-Bane backstab before finishing him off with Roaches. Game two revolved around a delayed Roach-Ravager-Ling + Queen-drop all-in, with the surprise factor seeming to overwhelm Stats despite his army having adequate firepower to defend.

Classic tried to get a comeback going, beating Ryung with mass Carriers in a slow macro game on Alcyone. However, the old master of the WTL took a point back on Crimson Court, baiting a Gateway-Disruptor army into an engagement and crushing it with a great surround.

With his teammates having set the table, Maru finished the meal by easily disposing of WTL novice Shameless with a couple of Tank pushes.

Starlight Twinkle 1 - 5 Weibo Gaming
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Weibo Gaming successfully 'debuted' in the WTL, earning a comfortable 5-1 victory against Starlight Twinkle.

WBG/DKZ ace herO got the best of Cham to start, despite some Swarm Host shenanigans from the trickster Zerg. Next, Krystianer and Jieshi split their series, with the Polish Protoss taking game one by holding out against multiple waves of Glaive-Adepts, while the SLT player won the more 'standard' macro PvP.

soO locked in Weibo Gaming’s victory with a typically solid ZvZ performance against Wayne. He deflected his opponent's low-tech Roach-Ravager-Ling all-in on Ghost River, and then won with a Roach-Hydralisk push on Oceanborn.


Shopify Rebellion 4 - 3 PSISTORM-NAVI
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Shopify and PSISTORM had themselves another classic WTL match, with ByuN's heroics leading the Rebellion to a narrow victory.

Unfortunately for sicko fans, Scarlett had nothing unusual planned for her opening bout against Spirit on Post-Youth, and instead engaged him in a fairly straight-up game. Spirit's initial Marine-Tank-Hellion push ended up doing a considerable amount of damage, which Spirit patiently snowballed into a late-game victory. Scarlett then went for a blind Roach poke on Goldenaura, but it failed to bear fruit as Spirit had played a 3-CC opener with a couple of safety Banshees. Spirit proceeded to get in a bunch of Drone kills with his Banshees, which put Scarlett in a very difficult spot. However, thanks to excellent combat micro—as well as shrewd exploitation of the huge size of the map—Scarlett was able to fight her way back into the game and eventually turn the situation around. Scarlett made sure the defensive specialist couldn't achieve his desired 50/50 map split, and eventually won the war of attrition at just over 34:00 on the clock.

Sadly for PSISTORM, WTL magician Namshar didn't have any new magic spells prepared against ByuN. He tried a Roach push and German Taxi in two games, but ByuN shut them down to put his team up 3-1. Hopefully, a wild Namshar will appear again this season against a less savvy player.

Lambo did his best to close the series out against MaxPax, bringing an old-school Hydra-Ling into Lurker strategy on Ghost River. However, the nature of the map allowed MaxPax to split the battlefield in half and eventually assemble an unstoppable Carrier force. With Lambo being one of the key innovators behind the ZvP Queen-walk, it wasn’t exactly surprising that it was his weapon of choice on Post-Youth. However, MaxPax seemed to have it in mind as well, as he defended it well to force an ace match.

Interestingly enough, PSISTORM decided to give Spirit ace duties over MaxPax for the second time this season, which might tell us a bit about how MaxPax feels about PvT these days. It almost paid off for PSISTORM, as Spirit absorbed ByuN's early attacks and launched a big Marine-Tank push that threatened ByuN's third. However, ByuN's well-executed breakout turned the game around in a matter of seconds, and he counterattacked to secure victory for his team.

Weekly MVP: SR.ByuN

For someone who's received many weekly MVP's before, sweeping Namshar and beating Spirit might not go down as an all-time performance for ByuN. However, in a week where most of the players that 'should' have won their match-ups actually did, getting a solid 3-0 was more than enough to get the MVP nod. ByuN improved to 12-2 and tied Maru for total number of map wins, which puts him in contention for regular season MVP as well.

Also, the whole Platinum Heroes squad deserves some recognition for their beatdown of Berserker. It looked a close match on paper, but the Heroes players won all of the 50/50's to make it a sweep.

Weekly MVP's:

• Week 6: SR.ByuN
  
• Week 5: BASILISK.Reynor
  
• Week 4: MYG.Cyan
  
• Week 3: SR.Scarlett
  
• Week 2: OG.Firefly
  
• Week 1: SLT.Krystianer

TL.net Moral Victory™ Recipients: KeeN, Nicoract

Preview: Regular Season Week 7

Due to a scheduling change, the first day of matches was moved to June 27th. These matches have already been played




Last season, Team Liquid upset Basilisk in the playoff semifinals to deny Serral, Reynor, and Trigger their chance at a WTL championship. The stakes will be lower in this regular season match, but it's still a must-see clash between two teams that have championship aspirations.

BASILISK will hope that ShoWTimE is ready to make a difference after giving one of his best performances in recent memory at HomeStory Cup. He and SKillous have had quite the series of battles lately, with the latest meeting in Krefeld ending in a 3-2 for ShoWTimE. This WTL battle should be tight as well, with 1-1 being the likely result.

Reynor has either won or lost the Clem lottery, which depends on what you think of both players' form lately. As each day brings us closer to the Esports World Cup, so rises Reynor's motivation to return to being a world championship-caliber player. However, the advantage has to go to Clem, who has been tearing it up in TvZ. His 20-match winning streak may recently have ended at the hands of Rogue in the Kung Fu Cup, but you shouldn't blame anyone for losing to Rogue in anything. I believe Clem should get at least a 1-1 against Reynor, and he has a decent shot at the 2-0 as well.

Thankfully for BASILISK, Serral is donating some of his free time to WTL duty this week. I’m not sure there’s any Terran I would give a chance against Serral, but I’m certain it's not Cure. Also, Cure will probably be keeping any tricky builds hidden for his GSL semifinal against Dark, so he'll probably play some standard macro that plays into Serral's hands (that, or gamble on his proxy 2-Rax locations).

Despite Serral being favored to take a 2-0, I believe SKillous and Clem can do just enough to force an ace-match against a full-strength BASILISK. I like Serral to win a potential ace match against Clem, but the Liquid ace definitely has a chance to steal it.

Prediction: BASILISK 4 - 3 Team Liquid



After suffering ace match heartbreaks in back-to-back weeks, PSISTORM will look to avoid the same fate against Twisted Fairy.

The opening match doesn't look very promising, as the allegedly retiring Nice takes on the very solid Spirit. Not only is Spirit one of the more bulletproof players in the scene, but his skills might be peaking ahead of the EWC.

If Nice can’t deliver a 1-1, it will fall on Stats to break down MaxPax. There’s some hope for Stats as he did tie MaxPax in WTL Winter, and PvP has been his overall best match-up since his return from the military. However, getting a 2-0 seems like too big an ask.

Gerald has a weirdly dominant record against Classic in recent years, having beaten him four straight times dating back to 2022. However, that seems more like a statistical quirk than a meaningful measure. Aligulac gives the Korean Protoss a 45% chance of a 2-0, which seems more realistic when considering both players' recent form. It's far from hopeless for Gerald, but he will be a small underdog.

With two PvP's, this match is bound to be a little bit hard to predict, but I have a feeling Twisted Fairy will be able to scratch out 3 maps to force an ace. There, both MaxPax and Spirit should have the advantage in the deciding battle.

Prediction: PSISTORM-NAVI 4 - 3 Twisted Fairy





Another Sunday, another Vitality beatdown it seems.

Ryung may not have gone far in Krefeld, but he’s still a damn good asset in WTL. So despite Berserker getting a fairly good draw to match him against DnS, a 1-1 split is probably the most they can hope for.

Maru's perfect record should last a week more against GungFuBanda. Despite some TvZ worries, he’s still as good as ever against Protoss and generally wipes the floor with weaker players than him.

There’s slightly more hope for BattleB against Solar, just because Solar recently lost a series to Coffee. However, Coffee is really on the up and up lately, so it's not the kind of massive upset we'd have considered it a year ago. In the end, I fear the difference in mechanics will be too much for BattleB to overcome.

Overall, Berserker's best hope is a very late GSL finals afterparty leaving Team Vitality in a hangover haze.

Prediction: Team Vitality 5 - 1 Berserker eSports



Despite my initial doubts, DKZ/Weibo Gaming are cruising in second place. The situation could change for them as they have matches vs PSISTORM, TL, and Shopify remaining, but at least in Week 7, they can look forward to getting a relatively easy three points off of Mystery Gaming.

For fear of becoming emotionally invested in soO's career again, I've tried to ignore the fact that he is once again a decent SC2 pro. However, after his latest Code S RO8 run and recent WTL performances, it's hard to remain in denial. In any case, he's a fairly big favorite to get the 2-0 against Strange. Now that I've said it, I've put on some boxing pads to prepare for the inevitable punch to the gut.

Cyan and Jieshi are virtually tied in their head-to-head in almost 150 maps, so while a 2-0 for either is possible, 1-1 is the average result.

The final match between herO and Coffee could be more interesting than expected if Strange and Cyan manage to hold up. The Chinese Terran is playing some of his best StarCraft lately, and melds macro with cheese in a way that can create trouble for nearly anyone. herO, of course, is on another level from most Protosses in the world. However, if the series isn't decided by the time Coffee gets to use his loser map pick, then he might have a series-changing all-in prepared.

As far as the ace match is concerned, the teams should send herO and Coffee for a third game. Since it will be on the very standard Oceanborn, herO should have a hefty advantage.

Prediction: Weibo Gaming 4 - 2 Mystery Gaming

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