Gaimin Gladiators ended their first tournament in the new formula only in the top eight.
headline picture credits: Valve
It seems like the start of the new competitive season is full of surprises. After Heroic landed a historic tournament victory only a week ago at PGL Wallachia, BetBoom Dacha Belgrade 2024 is keeping the excitement going with unexpected results in the playoffs stage.
TI13 runner up team, Gaimin Gladiators were expected to have at least a deep run in the tournament if not beginning the season with another grand final appearance. However, they started the playoffs stage in Serbia poorly by dropping into the lower bracket rounds right from the get-go, and continued with a total disaster.
Aurora take their first clean victory over Gaimin Gladiators in 2024
It’s been a minute since Aurora and Gaimin Gladiators faced off in a best-of-three series. The two teams have a few draw scores in various group stage series, but they didn’t play versus each other at The International 2023 nor in any playoff stage this whole year. The only time the two teams actually got to duke it out in a bo3 was back in March at DreamLeague Season 22.
A lot has changed for both teams since then. Aurora’s roster went through a few changes, while Gaimin changed their carry player in the post TI13 shuffle.
Alimzhan "watson" Islambekov brought a new set of heroes to Gaimin’s drafts and overall a slightly different approach to the safe lane. While his most played heroes in Belgrade are Shadow Fiend and Luna, as the ranged carry meta is still extremely popular, he also got to play his signature Terrorblade or give it a try to a carry Nature’s Prophet. Neither of these two picks worked for GG in Belgrade, and once they landed in the lower bracket, they reverted to Watson’s Luna, SF and Morphling.
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Gaimin GladiatorsGame one started with an interesting mid lane choice for GG, who used their last pick for a Quinn "Quinn" Callahan Broodmother. Aurora, however, geared up for a high tempo game with plenty of AoE damage to deal with the spiderlings and overall the push power of Brood. Although the game reached the one-hour mark, Aurora had a firm grip on the match to start with a win.
Game two brought an easy but extremely efficient combo between Storm Spirit and Grimstoke, which allowed Gaimin Gladiators to even the series in a pretty dominant fashion. But moving into the decider match, Grim and its mid lane pairing became the contention point of the drafting stage.
Aurora denied Quinn the chance of playing another Storm game, but allowed him to have his signature Invoker. They also felt comfortable letting the TI13 runners up have Broodmother once more even in the hands of Marcus "Ace" Christensen, who is a hero specialist, as they secured Grimstroke paired with Void Spirit.
Overall, Aurora’s draft had powerful lockdowns, plenty of AoE and strong right clicks to take the buildings down with a carry Luna and deliver the biggest upset in the tournament so far by eliminating Gaimin Gladiators.
While GG bow out of BetBoom Dacha Belgrade 2024 in the top 8, Aurora will continue their lower bracket run on Friday, October 25 against the new line-up of Team Spirit.
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