Image: Valve Software
Falcons have dominated BetBoom all year long, and even in this elimination match at TI 2024 the result was no different.
The battle for this year's Aegis of Champions is heating up as The International 2024 (TI 2024) Finals Weekend kicked off on Friday (September 13) with the third round of the lower bracket. In the first showdown in Copenhagen's Royal Arena, Western European juggernauts 
Team Falcons defeated Eastern Europe's 
BetBoom Team in a 2-0 sweep.
Falcons and BetBoom have faced each other a total of nine times this year before TI 2024. While BetBoom did manage to force 1-1 draws in a couple of Group Stage matchups, Falcons have been utterly dominant in their seven best-of-three and best-of-five showdowns.
Falcons' dominance over BetBoom continued into TI 2024, where both teams were placed in Group C during the Group Stage. Falcons swept BetBoom once again en route to securing the top seed of their group. In the Seeding Decider, Falcons defeated beastcoast to secure an upper bracket berth in the Playoffs. BetBoom's struggles continued however as they fell to Team Liquid and were forced to start in the lower bracket.
The Playoffs then saw Falcons fall to Tundra Esports in a 2-0 sweep and quickly get dropped to the lower bracket. However, they were quick to bounce back with their own 2-0 sweep over 1win to earn their spot in TI 2024's Finals Weekend. Meanwhile, BetBoom also secured a spot in the Top 8 by knocking out Talon Esports and nouns.
If BetBoom hoped to make a deep run in TI 2024, they needed to exorcise the demons that have haunted them all year long. Unfortunately, it was just not meant to be as Falcons emerged victorious yet again to make it to the Top 6.
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Team FalconsBetBoom opened the series with a heavy ranged-damage strategy with Alexander “TORONTOTOKYO” Khertek's support Mirana making use of his hero's Solar Flare Facet to buff Egor “Nightfall” Grigorenko on Windranger and Danil “gpk” Skutin's mid Nature's Prophet. Matvey “MieRo`” Vasyunin manned the front line as Doom while Vitalie “Save-” Melnic provided disables and magic burst damage as Lion.
Falcons drafted a lineup with tons of magic damage and crowd control with Oliver “skiter” Lepko's Lina, Stanislav “Malr1ne” Potorak's Sand King, Ammar “ATF” Al-Assaf on Primal Beast, and Andreas “Cr1t-” Nielsen on Hoodwink. Wu “Sneyking” Jingjun's Omniknight rounded out the draft as the team's sustain support.
Falcons came out swinging to start the series, as they dominated the laning stage and even scored an early team wipe in the bottom lane around the 8-minute mark. By the 20-minute mark, Falcons were up 10,000 gold in net worth and 21-4 in kills as Malr1ne repeatedly landed devastating Burrowstrike-Epicenter initiations in the one-sided fights.
A desperate attempt by BetBoom to claw their way back only resulted in Falcons winning another clash and the GG call being forced after 25 minutes of action. Malr1ne spearheaded his team's game one win with a perfect 13-kill, eight-assist performance out of his team's final 26-4 kill score, one of the rare moments of TI 2024 so far where it was clear one player was almost single-handedly responsible for giving his team the victory.
Game two saw BetBoom try to mount a comeback behind Nightfall's Medusa. Gpk on his signature Storm Spirit pick and MieRo's Doom looked to bridge their team to the late game while Save on Snapfire and TORONTOTOKYO on Elder Titan provided powerful teamfight abilities from the backlines.
Falcons countered with a hard-hitting, tanky tri-core of Dragon Knight for skiter, a mid Razor for Malr1ne, and Centaur Warrunner for ATF. Cr1t once again had Hoodwink again for crowd control and damage from long range while Sneyking on a support Mirana provided buffs for his Dragon Knight (when in Elder Dragon form) and Razor.
Just like in game one, Falcons dominated their opponents' slower lineup and were up 11-3 in kills and over 7,000 gold just 14 minutes in. Falcons only continued to run rampant, growing their gold lead to over 30,000 gold and breaking into their opponents' base. However, BetBoom managed to hold out long enough for Nightfall's Medusa to start peaking in strength and get a Divine Rapier at the 42-minute mark.
A BetBoom comeback then struck back hard in a clash beside the top Roshan Pit at the 48-minute mark, where Nightfall managed to avoid near-death and get a Triple Kill as his team scored a massive teamwipe.
BetBoom made good use of this opening to claim two sets of barracks and erase their opponents' gold lead, only for Falcons to catch them off-guard and take down Nightfall. Falcons only grew stronger off this, as Sneyking turned into another core and claimed Nightfall's Divine Rapier for himself.
While Nightfall acquired another Divine Rapier in an effort to salvage the situation, Falcons still managed to catch him out without buyback in the decisive clash outside of BetBoom's base. With the enemy carry out of the fight, Falcons simply could not be denied as they secured the 2-0 sweep after a near-hour thriller.
Malr1ne once again led the way for Falcons in the closeout game, racking up 11 kills and 13 assists on three deaths out of his team's 37-20 final kill score. Sneyking also pitched in with eight kills and 20 assists on five deaths while the rest of the team had six kills apiece.
With their victory, Falcons have secured a spot in the Top 6 as well as over $88,000 in winnings. They move on to lower bracket quarterfinals in the second day of TI 2024's Finals Weekend, where they will face the loser of the upper bracket semifinal match between Team Liquid and Cloud9.
Meanwhile, BetBoom end their TI 2024 run in a respectable 7th-8th place finish and will go home with over $63,000 in consolation.
TI 2024 is this year's iteration of Dota 2's annual world championship tournament and features 16 of the best teams in the world fighting for their cut of the growing $2.36 million prize pool and the Aegis of Champions.
The event is being hosted from September 4 to 15 in Copenhagen, Denmark and is split into two distinct phases: the Group stage (September 4 to 5) and the Seeding Deciders (September 6 to 7). The first two rounds of the Playoffs (September 8 to 10) are branded as part of The Road to The International, while the remaining portion of the Playoffs for the remaining eight teams (September 13 to 15) are branded as The International itself.
For everything you need to know about TI 2024, check here.
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