Cover-Credits:
The champions of the i-League Season 2 are Team Aster, who have played some stellar games of Dota 2 to defeat Vici Gaming in the grand final. Vici Gaming took the first game of the five-match series to take a 1-0 lead, but Team Aster came back with their top-notch draft and gameplay to win the next three games and win the series 3-1. Although the cores of the team did a great job, the support duo of Ye "Borax" Zhibiao and Zhang "LaNm" Zhicheng were standouts, both with their strong defensive abilities and their ganking skills. Du "Monet" Peng also performed as clean as ever on his safelane heroes.
Team Aster has won the i-League 2021 title twice now, having also defeated Vici Gaming in the first season.
Team Aster vs Vici Gaming: Match Recap and Highlights
Recap
As game 1 progressed, Team Aster made some incredible map maneuvers. Even though there was little combat and their networth lead was paltry, they appeared to be ahead of the game. Vici Gaming turned the tide with a crucial teamfight win at 30 minutes, and they went on to win in 38 minutes.
In game 2, Vici Gaming selected Anti-Mage for Poyoyo, who had a decent game on paper. Since Team Aster knew this, they played fast and relentlessly, taking objective after objective to force their enemies to fight. Vici Gaming fought well and held on to their base for a bit, but they couldn't farm freely and Aster ended in 42 minutes.
In game 3, Vici Gaming surprisingly chose Tinker as the last pick against the enemy midlaner's Batrider. As a whole, Team Aster seemed to have an inherent advantage in the draft. During the first 20 minutes of the game, a few skirmishes did not seem to benefit either team, but Aster's cores seemed to grow stronger. Monet played an impeccable game on his safelane Juggernaut to win in 44 minutes.
Game 4 saw Team Aster put together a strong draft. The majority of Vici Gaming's draft, however, revolved around the safelane Slark. Team Aster went for constant pickoffs in the middle stages, making the enemy cores' lives difficult. Poyoyo's Slark was ultimately the decisive factor, and while Vici Gaming offered a strong fight, they were far behind in networth, losing in 41 minutes.
Highlights
Here are some highlights of the series.
Team Aster's strong performance in Chinese Dota 2 continues. Throughout the group stages and playoffs, they lost just one series. In the grand final, only one hero was chosen for all of the four games, Pudge. While this may be surprising, Team Aster used both his Meat Hooks and Aghanim's Shard saves to great effect. The Chinese squad will strive to extend this form into international competition and deliver strong performances at The International 10 (TI10).
Vici Gaming performed well but fell just short of becoming the champions, as it has in many past instances. While their drafts were not as good as their counterparts in many of the games in the grand final, they also got outplayed in crucial contests.
The two teams will now likely be headed to Romania to bootcamp for TI10. TI10 will be held from 7th to 17th Oct, 2021.
