Evil Geniuses Dominates Day One of MDL Macau 2019
The third-ranked team in the Dota Pro Circuit, Evil Geniuses, showcased their skills on the first day of the MDL Macau 2019 tournament. However, it wasn’t a flawless start for them.
The tournament is currently in the round robin opening round. After each team competes in a best-of-one match against every other team, the playoffs will be seeded.
EG faced off against Virtus Pro in their tournament opener. VP, being the favorites as Team Secret is playing at ESL One Katowice, were expected to perform well. However, EG proved that they are ready to compete against top contenders.
With their aggressive playstyle, Evil Geniuses secured a quick 26-minute victory. They continued their dominant performance against Newbee and Royal Never Give Up, but did stumble in a match against Vici Gaming.
Despite missing SumaiL Hassan, one of their key players who is taking a vacation before the next round of DPC events, EG’s stand-in Quinn “CC&C” Callahan performed admirably for the team.
At the end of the first day, EG claimed the top spot with a 3-1 record. Team Liquid closely followed with a 2-1 record after defeating Invictus Gaming and a severely weakened EHOME roster.
EHOME managed to secure a 2-2 record despite facing challenges. Zhao “XinQ” Zixing from Team Serenity stepped in as a last-minute substitute after Zhang “Faith_bian” Ruida suffered an upper arm fracture while filming the team video before the event.
This injury added more pressure to the team, especially after their coach, Dota 2 veteran Zhang “xiao8” Ning, announced that he would stand-in for his team due to a delayed passport for Li “ASD” Zhiwen. Despite these challenges, EHOME managed to put up a strong fight against Vici, Liquid, and Newbee.
On the other hand, VP had a tough tournament, winning only one out of their next two matches. Invictus Gaming had a disappointing performance, going 0-3 and currently having the worst record heading into day two.
On February 20th at 9pm CT, EHOME and VP will face each other in the ongoing stage of MDL Macau.