After last seasons disappointing drop into the lower echelons of progaming, 2006 Proleague Champions MBCGame Hero have stormed back with a vengeance and ravaged their way back into the top four. Whats the secret? Was it fresh blood in the camp? Nope. Was it a slumping player returning to form? Almost. What was the secret? They brought back Coach Ha - one of the best in the business. Well, that in addition to their old players coming back into pseudo-form.

While this is all great for MBC as a short-term fix, bringing back your old greats to lead the way to the future in an inherently flawed strategy. MBC has consistently relied on it's older players to step up and lead the way for the rest of the team. Ever since they lost Bisu and Coach Park they've really stopped cultivating new talent. They've tried - but look how that turned out;

Yes, once upon a time Jaehoon was a Protoss player with potential! He featured in the MSL Prematch tournament back in 2006 (right when Longinus was still a twilight map) and his impressive Macro play made him look like the next big Protoss star. But clearly that just simply hasn't eventuated. Furthermore, han has been "almost great" for a while now - indeed he took out Jaedong back in the OSL Prelims in the season before Jaedong won his 2nd OSL. Han has started to show some promise, but really, he doesn't look like anything overly special. Hyun falls into the same category as Han - almost great - but constantly falls short.

Sadly, it's up to the veterans Sea, Light, Saint and Pusan to lead the way. But bleh, Pusan isn't playing anything resembling good Starcraft at the moment (despite the hype). Saint is getting some lucky wins, but his ZvT is so abysmal it's depressing. Now we come to the two pillars of MBC - Light and Sea. Unfortunately, despite Sea's results - he's only playing TvT. Sea's recent turn of good results is a reflection of his good TvT - and nothing else (and he's specialized on Moon Glaive as well, that will get rotated out soon probably as well). Sea failed in both prelims because of his TvZ/TvP - and I don't know how much you can really trust him.

Light... Light is an enigma. Light is the "ace" of MBC in the sense that he's the best player, but he's just not phenomenal. A teams strength can be gauged by the strength of it's Ace - never in the history of Progaming has a team been successful without a star player to back them. Light just doesn't stack up as a star player. Yea, he pulls results. Yea, he plays okay. But he much better plays the role of support player to say Sea than the star of the show. If Light is able to pull some real league results then maybe he'll be able to take that next jump and take MBC with him - but in all honesty I don't see that happening.

So while the skies are clear at the moment for MBC, and a top four placing is in sight, there are dark clouds looming on the horizon. Without any deserving talent coming through it is only a matter of time before the Veterans fail and the team descends into a eSTRO like state where they are incapable of winning stuff since they have a roster full of mediocre players. *sigh* as a MBC fan I wish there was something more heartening to talk about.. but unfortunately, MBC is a team living in the past - quite literally - and that has to end very very soon.

This week's Game of the Week features two big names - Free, a Protoss who has been performing pretty well in proleague recently, and Effort, the successor to CJ's zerg throne. Clashing on Match Point, a map introduced this season that to us laymen would seem like a vertical Blue Storm with some hints of Peaks of Baekdu, we expect a great game to be played out.

The game opened as expected, Effort overpooling and double expanding to his nat and the top left gas base, and Free FEing while trying, with some success, to block Effort's hatchery. Entering the midgame, Free teched up to stargate and started corsair production and their weapons upgrade, and Effort, predictably, dropped a couple more hatcheries after getting his spire. Strangely, however, Effort opted for mutalisks, instead of making the transition into hydras - in hindsight, a poor choice against Free's gradually rising corsair count.

As Effort's mutas arrived at Free's nat accompanied by some scourges, Free greeted him with more than enough corsairs to turn him away, but not before Effort sniped off a fair number of probes. With Effort's mutas now on the run, Free took the opportunity to expand to his mineral only, while a small force of zealots were sent out to put some pressure on the Zerg. Unfortunately, the zealots met a well simcitied base, but Free found success elsewhere, catching most of Effort's mutas with his corsairs.



With his third up, Free started adding new gateways, while harassing with his corsairs and a couple of DTs, nabbing a group of overlords in the process. Effort, sick of being on the receiving end of things, then brought his hydra army to Free's third looking to destroy it and even the game a little. Roughly 2 groups of hydras stormed into the mineral only, but storm rained down on them, and the defense of 4 cannons held. A second attempt with some new reinforcements was similarly turned away, putting Effort further behind.



Undeterred, Effort took his mineral only, and with a small number of lurkers, set up a nice formation on the high ground above Free's mineral only, in the meantime, heading towards hive. Instead of engaging the lurkers from low ground, Free simply marched his army out via the small ramp at his nat and headed towards Effort's third. Upon scouting this, Effort quickly retreated his lurkers, but tragically, they were caught in transit and decimated. It seemed the game would be over quickly; Free had an insanely large army - enough to roll Effort easily.



What happened next was some amazing defense by Effort. Time and again, he sniped Free's observers, enabling him to just barely defend with his lurkers and lings. Each time when it seemed like Free was just about to break through his defense, he'd successfully kill Free's observers, and force Free to retreat, buying more time for him to rebuild his units and for his hive tech to kick in. Many battles raged at the Effort's high ground, and Free was denied a countless amount of times, despite reinforcing with both units and observers.



Effort too, was on top of Free's expanding, keeping him from taking a third gas with some ninja lings. Eventually, hive tech kicked in, and with Free's gases depleted, and minerals running dry, he was unable to reinforce his army. Swarm and adrenalings took their toll, and Free was forced back with lings on his tail.



In control now, Effort simply expanded and continued denying Free his third gas, attacking everywhere with lings. He broke through at Free's nat after a while, drawing the GG from Free in an excellent game.

Effort's constant scourging of Free's observers put a huge dent in Free's attacks, and with Free being so close to breaking through every time, he probably didn't see the need to take another base, instead committing all his resources into the attack that failed. Tragic defeat for the Protoss player, but a great game overall.

The final week approaches and the race is tight with the points difference at the top almost negligible due to trades. IntoTheWow has pushed himself into top position with a heavy trading game, but his position is shaky with many others nipping at his heels.

---

---

• Violet Streak
  KT Rolster has returned to the money making table, earning 11 points for its owners (just under the week high of 12 points by MBC). However, the top earners of the weeks were the players with Violet bringing in 14 points after an ace win and Stork redeeming himself with 11. Flash also in the big earners but still trails Zero in total points.
  
  
• Rolstered
  KT Rolster cemented their place as the team of the competition with a clear points lead over rivals SKT1 and the new in 3rd place MBCGame HERO. KT now has 3 players in the top ten points earners while Woongjin Stars has two and SKT1 has none. However streaky runs by players like Sea, ZerO and Really have allowed smart traders to cash in an keep the fight fair.
  
  
• You khan be saved
  Stork has brought redemption to Samsung KHAN, returning it from the depths and pushing it not only into a positive total points but ahead in its unexpected rivalry with ACE for bottom position. Making team choices tricky for next round, Hwaseung and Hite also both occupy unexpectedly low ranks.
  
  
• Wrapping Up
  While there are only Four playdays left, the big stars have two matches each keeping the race interesting. KT, SKT1, STX and Hite finally butt heads again with each other which could ultimately push the KT Rolster pack into fantasy proleague domination.

---

IntoTheWow - Currently in First place.
Forum vigilante, Argentinian secret agent - ITW is many things. This round, he is also using his ninja prowess to kick it in FPL. Pachi caught up with him in Buenos Aires (don't ask us what pachi was doing there - what happens in Buenos Aires stays in Buenos Aires) to try and pry his FPL trade formula out of him.

+ Show Spoiler [Interview] +