The lower bracket finals at the Mars Dota 2 League ended with LGD Gaming claiming their spot in the grand finals to face off against LGD.Forever Young once more.
The lower bracket final at the Mars Dota 2 League would see another China showdown as Newbee went into battle with LGD Gaming. The winner of the game would find themselves in the grand finals of MDL, facing LGD.Forever Young, while the loser would be going home. With all 3 teams remaining hailing from the mighty Chinese Dota region and all heading to The International 2017 in just a few weeks, the competition would be interesting. After LGD lost out to their sister team yesterday, they would be looking for a chance at redemption, while LFY were also the team who knocked Newbee into the lower bracket – so they too would be looking to take the grand finals by storm.
Game One
A good start to the game for Newbee would see them take a small lead in the opening ten minutes, claiming a few kills and the mid tier 1 tower in this time. But this advantage did not last long as LGD looked hungry for the win and as twenty minutes passed, they begun to take complete control of the game, utilising Wang 'AME-' Chunyu on the Chaos Knight’s Phantasm ability to cut down Newbee’s defenses.
With just over twenty five minutes passed, LGD felt brave enough to go high ground in the bottom lane but were met with a stern defense from Newbee, who showed signs of finding their footing in the game once more. But their defense, and base, did not last much longer and within a few minutes, LGD returned to rip through the Dire line up and force out the GG from Newbee, giving game 1 of the series to LGD.
Game Two
A quick start to the game saw Newbee grabbing an early first blood along with another kill a few seconds later too as they looked to tie up the series. Within a few minutes, Newbee had racked up a 8-1 lead as Zeng 'Faith' Hongda on the Shadow Shaman was making fantastic rotations around the map, not allowing LGD any breathing room. By seventeen minutes, Newbee were looking set to take the game, with all 3 tier 1 Radiant towers removed from the map and an aegis in hand.
After twenty one minutes, Newbee moved their attack to high ground and dropped the top lane barracks without any defense coming in from the Radiant. Newbee waited out the next aegis and with that in hand, they looked to completely close out the game. But as the Dire team moved onto the high ground bot lane, they were met with a fantastic defense from LGD which resulted in 4 kills going in their favour.
Suddenly there was some life in LGD, even though they were losing barracks to the “rat” strategy coming out of Chun 'SCCC' Song's Invoker, as they managed to find kills continuously. But with forty five minutes passed, and mega creeps beating at their tier 4 towers, LGD looked very unlikely to win. With another aegis in hand, Newbee finally managed to close out the game and tie up the series at 1-1, taking us to a deciding game 3.
Game Three
The deciding game of the series would see both teams having a fairly even start, and by ten minutes, while Newbee held a 5-3 lead on the scoreboard, there was not much else separating them. It took fifteen minutes for any major openings to show but when it came, it was game changing - as Newbee went into the Roshan pit. It ended up being a complete disaster for Newbee as LGD contested and dropped the entire Dire team and claimed the aegis for themselves. Suddenly LGD took complete control of the game as they found another 4 kills just a few minutes later and put Newbee on the back foot.
After just over twenty one minutes, with some absolutely perfect plays from Chen 'Victoria' Guanhong on the Earth Spirit and Newbee having absolutely no chance in the game, they threw in the towel, giving game 3 and the series to LGD Gaming. LGD would now go on to face their sister squad again in the best-of-five grand finals at the Mars Dota 2 League later today.
image courtesy of Zakucj.Dota
