Secret Takes ESL One Frankfurt Crown; Bests Evil Geniuses 3-1
After a bloody four-match finals set at the Commerzbank Football Arena in Frankfurt, Germany, Team Secret defeated Evil Geniuses, 3-1, to win the ESL One Frankfurt title.
In Game 1, EG took down Secret with a score of 36-20 as the American squad leaned on a heavy sustain line-up. Syed Sumail “Suma1L” Hassan ended the game with a score of 15-8-16 on Leshrac, paired with a 10-2-18 Razor by Clinton “Fear” Loomis. Backed by a Winter Wyvern pick on Curtis “Aui_2000” Ling, the two carries dominated mid-game engagements and eventually put away Secret at the 65 minute mark.
But Games 2 through 4 belonged to Secret. The international team mowed down EG in 30 minute routs.
Game 2 featured a unique drafting strategy from Secret. The team allowed the Storm Spirit through to Suma1L. Stranger still, Secret did not draft silence heroes to help lock down the Storm Spirit.
Storm Spirit, regarded as one of Suma1L’s best heroes, went toe-to-toe against Gustav ‘s4‘ Magnusson’s Viper. What looked like an easy Storm Spirit game ended poorly for the rest of EG’s lanes. Fear’s Bristleback was constantly kited by the s4’s Viper in team fights, allowing Artour “Arteezy” Babaev’s Gyrocopter to wreak havoc on EG’s back lines. In the end, the game was won on the back of key item pick-ups (most notably, Glimmer Cape) from Secret, allowing Clement “Puppey” Ivanov to deal massive damage on the Crystal Maiden support during engagements.
Game 3’s early game advantages went squarely into Evil Geniuses favor. Suma1L, on the Tinker, quickly dispatched s4’s Shadow Fiend thanks to an early Laser and Heat-Seeking Rocket build. Ludwig “zai” Wåhlberg was similarly shut down on the offlane, as his Dark Seer was caught out by EG’s support rotations.
But the game quickly snowballed away from EG’s control as Arteezy picked up some aggressive early game kills on the Anti-Mage to speed up his gold gain. As EG scrambled to shut down the farming Anti-Mage, Kuro “KuroKy” Salehi Takhasomi — playing the Rubick — managed to steal important skills from EG that allowed Secret to achieve parity in the mid-game.
With every successive item pick-up, EG’s carries fell an item behind every step of the way. After a devastating top-lane push that resulted in multiple kills for Arteezy, EG was forced to call GG.
The final game was an all out brawl for both teams. EG went with an almost “four protect one” strategy to give Fear’s Anti-Mage free reign all over the map. Thanks to EG’s support rotations and Suma1L’s firepower on the Zeus, Fear racked up a quick 5-2 record to corale Secret into their base and away from their own jungle.
But Secret would not give up. The team employed a line-up focused on winning large-scale engagements, based around zai’s Dark Seer, s4’s Lina and Arteezy’s Blood Seeker while KuroKy’s Naga Siren setup the fight with a well-placed song. Whenever their cooldowns were up, Secret managed to claw back into the scoreboard even as EG ran rampant around the map.
The breakthrough came after a fight for the ages down The Radiant side of midlane. An initation gone wrong for EG found 3 of their heroes caught out behind the Tier 2 tower and into a Song of the Siren, only to be followed up with a Wall of Replica into a Vacuum.
EG’s captain, Peter “ppd” Dager on the Earthshaker, tried to salvage the fight but to no avail. Secret took the fight with five kills, including the Aegis from Fear. As Fear retreated, Secret once again took the initative and landed a combination of Light Strike Array, Blood Rite and Laguna Blade to bench Fear for 70 seconds.
As Secret barrelled down midlane for the Dire barracks, a last-ditch buyback from the Anti-Mage was not enough to save their base from Secret’s siege.
With the win, Team Secret has finished in the top spot for their fourth consecutive LAN event. The team will take home the lion’s share of the prize purse at $118,481. Evil Geniuses will take home $59,241.
The finals match drew in over 1 million concurrent viewers over popular videogame streaming platform, Twitch.
Banner photo from Reddit.com
In-set GIFs from Reddit.com
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