By REYNALD MAGALLON
Raven “Raven” Fausto gave Fnatic a huge lift to help force another 1-1 draw against Chinese team Elephant while the Evil Geniuses absorbed a 2-0 beatdown at the hands of Invictus Gaming in their final assignments in Day 1 of the group stages of The International on Thursday, October 7.
Fnatic, led by Filipinos Raven and Djardel “DJ” Mampusti, scored its second draw in Day 1 after also pulling off a 1-1 standing against Vici Gaming earlier in the day. Just like in that game, Fnatic dropped Game 1 but came alive in Game 2 to avoid a sweep.
Elephant dominated the Southeast Asian squad in a 17-7 victory in Game 1. The China-based team banked on the fine plays from Zhang “Eurus” Chengjun’s Tiny and Zhou “Yang” Haiyang’a Lycan with 5-2-6 and 3-1-11 KDAs respectively.
Fnatic, though, led by Raven and captain Anucha “Jabz” Jirawong rallied in Game 2 to take a 33-13 victory. A clutch initiation in the final fight allowed Fnatic to kill four heroes on the side of Elephant to seal the win.
Raven and Jabz conspired in Game 2 with 11-2-13 and 5-1-21 KDAs respectively.
EG, on the other hand, couldn’t sustain the rousing start to its TI campaign that saw them sweep T1 and Team Aster, falling to IG in a 2-0 fashion in its third game in Day 1.
IG was too hot for EG to handle as it cruised to 37-21 and 22-17 victories in Games 1 and 2.
The Abed “Abed” Yusop-led EG couldn’t find any answers for the Singapore Major champions as Zhou “Emo” Yi and Thiay Jun “JT-“ Wen wreaked havoc for IG in Game 1.
Emo on his Lina and JT- on his Mars dictated the tempo for IG finishing with 12-4-13 and 7-2-22KDAs respectively.
It was the same story for IG in Game 2 as Flyfly this time took over on his Morphling with a 9-1-7 score line while Emo provided the support on his Templar Assassin to contribute 7-1-11 KDAs.