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After six days of tough competition, it was the Danish giants Astralis celebrating once again. They took the $250,000 top prize on offer in Dallas, Texas in the ESL Pro League Season 7 Finals.
It was a dominant performance by the Danish CS:GO team and their second big victory in a month, following on from their $100,000 win at the DreamHack Masters Marseille 2018 back in April.
The majority of Astralis’ active roster has been together for over two years now. While dev1ce, dupreeh, Xyp9x, Magisk, and Gla1ve took a little while to gel, they’ve been in form for a minute. They landed a $500,000 top prize at the ELEAGUE Major Atlanta 2017 and another top prize at the Intel Extreme Masters XI – World Championship that year.
ESL Pro League results
Their progress in these ESL Pro League Finals was hugely impressive, losing just one set across all the games they played, including the final.
Astralis cruised through the group stages, winning their opening best-of-one clash with OpTic Gaming comprehensively 16-3. Then, they defeated SK Gaming 2-0 (16-11, 16-10) followed by another 2-0 win over Team Liquid (16-10, 16-7) to claim the top position in Group B.
That saw them seeded into the playoff semifinals where they faced old rivals FaZe Clan. Astralis once again proved far too strong, sweeping their opponents aside with another 2-0 win (16-3, 16-6).
Team Liquid met Astralis in the final, a repeat of the top seed match in Group B. It seemed to be going all Astralis’ way; they took the first set by an incredible 16-1 scoreline. Team Liquid, however, made a real fight of it in the next two sets, losing the second 16-14, but then took one off Astralis in the third, also by a 16-14 scoreline, to make the score 2-1.
On Inferno though, Team Liquid couldn’t match that performance to force a decider. Astralis claimed the win with a 16-12 victory for a 3-1 match win to secure the $250,000 top prize.
The all-conquering Astralis will be back in action next at the Esports Championship Series Season 5 Finals in London on June 8.
North claim DreamHack Tours 2018 title
It has been eight months since North last tasted victory in a Major event. They broke that streak this past weekend thanks to taking first place and a $50,000 cash prize in the DreamHack Tours 2018.
Like Astralis, North are another Danish team. Their form looked to be on the up when they finished second to Hellraisers in last month’s Bets.bet Masters Season 1 event. They certainly carried that through over the weekend.
Starting in Group B, North won their opening two matches, the first a nail-biting 16-14 win over The Imperial. Following this, the team achieved a more comfortable 16-8 win over Team EnVyUs to secure the top position in the group.
In the playoff semifinal, Gambit Esports lay in wait, and their rivals got off to a good start, taking the opening set of the best-of-three semi 16-13. However, North struck back to win the final two sets 16-11 and 16-5 to move smoothly into the final.
Then, they once again met Hellraisers, but this time North emerged victorious. Taking the first two sets 16-12 and 16-9 to claim a 2-0 win and the top prize.
North will be back in action at the StarSeries & i-League CS:GO Season 5 event in Kiev, with a $300,000 prize pool up for grabs. This event starts May 28 and will continue through June 3.
DPC rankings updated after GESC Thailand and MDL Changsha Major
Two big Dota Pro Circuit events are complete following GESC Thailand 10 days ago. Then, this past weekend PSG.LGD claimed a second win in three events at the MDL Changsha Major.
PSG.LGD’s victory was all the more remarkable because they only qualified as one of the No. 4 seeds after the initial group phase, ensuring they would have the most difficult and circuitous route to the final.
Starting in the Lower Bracket, PSG.LGD defeated iG Vitality 1-0 to move into Round 2 where they defeated the much-fancied TNC Pro Team 2-1. In Round 3, they overcame another big favourite in Team Secret 2-0. Then, in Round 4, Newbee fell, once again by a 2-0 scoreline.
Those four wins saw them take on Vici Gaming in the Lower Bracket Final, where PSG.LGD once again showed their class to claim a 2-0 victory and a place in the Grand Final. Here, they faced VGJ.Storm, winners of the previous week’s event, but PSG.LGD were on a roll and ran out comfortable 3-0 winners to claim the top prize.
Those performances have radically altered the makeup of the current standings of the Dota Pro Circuit rankings. PSG.LGD now stands in second place behind long-time leaders Virtus.pro.
Dota Pro Circuit rankings (top 16 shown)
- pro – 8097
- LGD – 6321
- Team Liquid – 6084
- Team Secret – 4800
- Mineski – 3150
- Vici Gaming – 2835
- Newbee – 2445
- Thunder – 1935
- Storm – 1347
- Evil Geniuses – 1335
- Natus Vincere – 1199
- Fnatic – 1040
- OG – 930
- FlyToMoon – 675
- TNC Pro Team – 495
- OpTic Gaming – 450
With just two events left in the DPC season — ESL One Birmingham 2018 on May 23 and the huge China Dota 2 Supermajor on June 2 — there is still time and enough points available for these rankings to change.
