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Coverage
Westdoor, while originally known for his Twisted Fate, has been consistently bringing out Gragas and performing well pretty much every time. The game started aggressive as Lantyr headed into Saigon Jokers' red side, pushing Safety out of his jungle at level 1.
Following up to the invasion, ahq coordinated a four-man dive top very early into the game, pushing the jungle and bottom lane into a pretty noticeable lead. After grabbing yet another successful gank, Lantyr and his team grouped for dragon, taking it freely and developing a very solid advantage.
With the assistance of his team, MrAlbis was able to continue snowballing on Vayne to get to the greatly desired hypercarry status. Ahq were making all the right moves to make it happen, committing to dives and allowing Vayne to reap the gold rewards to skip the weak early game phase entirely; a scary notion with a Yorick also on the team.
MrAlbis wouldn't be the only carry this game, however, as we may have foreshadowed before. Westdoor would step in and show his prowess on Gragas, forcing unfavorable fights for SAJ and impressive engages from ahq, whose strategy and execution would leave them unstoppable.
What ahq harnessed in this game was a working, AD carry centric composition which works in season 3, an impressive feat in and of itself. Between the mispositioning of Gragas, the peel of Thresh, Gragas, and Lee Sin, and the cloning of Vayne if everything else falls through, MrAlbis had complete freedom to carry the game. The team snowballed him early and allowed for such a safe composition that nothing could possibly go wrong.
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The important thing to note in this game - its first minutes unfortunately cut from the VOD - is Saigon Jokers truly bringing the pain in the early game against Singapore Sentinels. Just twelve minutes in, Singapore Sentinels were more than 3 games behind, a scary notion for a season that's almost over and a team that is increasingly close to first place.
The deficit would only get worse when Singapore Sentinels were caught yet again in their jungle. However, Hyhy rarely has been seen dropping a game on Karthus and Chawy has been known to defend his SEA All-Star title for AD carry when in need. With a solid engage bottom and a double kill picked up by Requiem, SGS followed up with dragon and were back in the game.
A key winning factor for Singapore Sentinels to even the playing fields was Hyhy's excellent usage of Wall of Pain, catching off members of SAJ for engagement opportunities. Though SAJ had a lot of CC, Chawy countered it by building an early quicksilver and was quickly becoming unstoppable.
36 minutes in, Singapore Sentinels would prove to have the superior teamfighting ability, scoring an ace while only losing two members of their own. This allowed them to grab an inhibitor and back out. Their CC and AoE damage would allow them to close out a game that was looking very grim for them in the beginning with Hyhy and Chawy tearing up the Jokers.
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Perhaps one of the most important games in both teams' careers would decide if ahq stayed clearly ahead in the lead or if there would be a tie for the throne. The game's drafting phase allowed very favorable picks for both teams, with Chawy on Varus, Hyhy on Karthus, and Westdoor on Gragas. Everyone was in their comfort zone.
As the laning phase commenced, Chawy was at it again, grabbing a very early first blood against Mr. Albis. Though Lantyr has been solid most of the season, he was outwitted by Harleluyar and would end up very far behind in the jungle. After grabbing a two tower lead, ahq converged mid to attempt to take out the last remaining outer turret of the game.
Singapore Sentinels were grasping further and further advantages, continuing their turret lead with only Westdoor having a positive score on ahq. Due to Singapore Sentinels' superior ward placement and map control, they were able to group and tower dive, snowballing Chawy's Varus to an even scarier threshold.
The battles that commenced afterwards would not look like Singapore Sentinels were facing off against the top team in the region as they would just crush through teramfights and pressure the inhibitors. SGS's Korean style pushing play as well as their performance on trademarked champions would allow them to crush ahq and share the thrown with the previously decisive leaders.
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Standings
