Fnatic will be in for a tough battle in the opening round of the upcoming ESL One New York after they were paired up against European giants, Team Secret.
Both teams faced one another at the ESL One Frankfurtz recently, though Secret came out on top in that battle. This time around though, Fnatic will be looking to push through and continue the development of a team that was recently revamped.
After their poor performance at The International in August, Fnatic made several key changes to its’ Dota2 roster – bringing in three new faces in the form of Dominic ‘Black^’ Reitmeir, Wai Pern ‘Net’ Lim, as well as Djardel ‘DJ’ Mampusti.
Most Dota2 fans will be familiar with Black^, who is largely known as a major veteran of the game, and was even present at the TI5 last month as MVP HOT6ix’s coach. Net on the other hand, is an unpredictable player, who has previously teamed up with Mushi as well as Ohaiyo. DJ is arguably one of Philippines finest, and was part of the RAVE team that gave Fnatic a major run for their money, in the race to secure the elusive TI5 invite earlier this year.
The winner of this duel will move into the semi-final, where they will face either FIRE or CDEC Gaming, depending on which team wins that tie.
On the other side of the bracket, Virtus Pro will be taking on EHOME.cn while Vega Squadron will be going up against recently crowned TI5 champions, Evil Geniuses.
ESL One New York will be the biggest LAN tournament to take place since the TI5, which a hefty cash prize of $250,000 USD being offered.
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