Cover-Credits:
It was an eventful day at BetBoom Dacha Dubai 2024, as two of the strongest teams Gaimin Gladiators and Team Spirit, who also happened to be last year's TI (The International) finalists, were eliminated. In the lower bracket of the playoffs, Gaimin Gladiators played against a very familiar opponent in Team Liquid but lost by a score of 2-1 despite having won almost all of their head-to-head matches in the past year. Similarly, in the second series of the day, Spirit, which tends to do well against Chinese teams, lost to Azure Ray 2-0. Strong drafts by Liquid and Azure Ray played a key role in these two outcomes.
Gaimin and Team Spirit finish 5th-6th at BetBoom Dacha Dubai 2024
In the first series, Gaimin faced Liquid, with the former holding the advantage based on past results. Gaimin has established itself as a team that gains dominance over the map in the opening 20 minutes of the game, so Liquid arrived well prepared this time around, thanks to an unusual game one draft.
With a carry Marci, mid Sniper, and offlane Batrider, Liquid dominated the lanes and took the opportunity to play aggressively and push Gaimin behind. The Sniper was aided by a support Io, and the team worked together to secure a convincing victory.
There was a stark contrast to Liquid's second game, which had a fairly slow placed draft. While it found kills with significant nuke damage, there were no stuns for the middle stages when teamfights took place, making the game difficult to play, and Gaimin won after 42 minutes.
In the third game, Gaimin's teamfight focused composition resulted in strong mid to late game timing, but Liquid was wise to have several cores scaling in its lineup, and Michael "miCKe" Vu was a beast on Windranger, finishing with a 20-2-11 KDA to help the team win the series 2-1.
In contrast, the second series of the day featured two intense games between Spirit and Azure. The first one had competitive drafts on the table, and it proved to be just as competitive, although Azure dominated the teamfights to win.
Azure delivered another outstanding performance in the second game, dominating the winning lanes and then maintaining its momentum to earn the series victory.
Both Gaimin and Spirit, particularly the former, are not used to being ousted early in the playoffs but will settle for 5th-6th place at BetBoom Dacha Dubai 2024. The opponents brought strong drafts and played them perfectly, and a performance of this caliber was necessary to knock these two veterans out of the competition.
As the BetBoom Dacha Dubai 2024 tournament proceeds, the last four teams are BetBoom Team, Team Falcons, Team Liquid, and Azure Ray.
