Both of the teams tonight came in needing a victory in order to prevent themselves from falling further away from a playoff chance. They came in on upswings this stage, but only one could walk away with a win. Unfortunately for the Charge, it was the hometown squad with all the cheers in the world at their backs who took the win tonight.
Yiliang “Eileen” Ou
Jungwoo “Happy” Lee
Hongjun “HOTBA” Choi
Seungpyo “Rio” Oh
Jungyeon “Chara” Kim
Jinseo “Shu” Kim
On Well, the Charge ran a Wrecking Ball variation of 3-3. They got the initial point cap off of quick roll into Youngseo “KariV” Park by Rio, and held for most of the round. However, the Valiant claimed the objective after 77% was taken, and Guangzhou found themselves unable to take back the point all round.
On the Lighthouse phase, they chose to run a traditional 3-3. The initial point went the way of the Charge but the Valiant quickly secured it instead. The fights on this map were back and forth, but ultimately, LOs Angeles reclaimed and won the map 100-66.
Image Courtesy of Blizzard Entertainment
On their Defense, the Guangzhou Charge opted into playing Sombra GOATS, a rising league trend. They provided a solid hold with several big plays, but nearly gave up in overtime. The Charge went on and halted LA with an EMP on the latter’s first push on B. Eventually, LA cleared the point and took two points with 2:16 in bank.
On offense, Guangzhou forced the Valiant off the high ground and took two ticks quickly, but were staved off. However, a huge EMP shatter combo cleaned up point with over a minute left. The Charge turned point B into a massive snowball, taking the round with a much higher 4:18 left.
Holding defense once again, the Charge themselves gave up two ticks early, but prevented a quick full take of A. Ultimately, the Valiant did take A in overtime, off of a pin onto Chara, killing him while he was trying to ult. Guangzhou regrouped, and gave up 60% on B, but cleared the point and prevented another double cap.
On the second go, the plan was to build up an Eileen EMP to destroy the enemy team. The EMP wasn’t immediately successful, but then the Charge wiped the Valiant out off of a big grav and shatter, denying Russell “FCTFCTN” Campbell hiw own shatter. Eileen then charged a second EMP, hit KariV on B, and secured the Charge a well-executed map win.
On the offense, Guangzhou began with a triple-dps/Hammond composition. It took over a minute, but it enabled an overall fast capture of A. The Charge then switched to Sombra GOATS with Ana variant. They pushed through nearly all of B before the Valiant halted them. Several failed pushes elapsed and the time bank dwindled, but Guangzhou finally pushed into C with only 13 seconds remaining. They then managed to complete the map in Overtime.
Their defense on the other hand was rather weak. While they stalled the capture of A for over two minutes, they couldn’t put up a single good hold on the payload section of the map. Opting out of a Sombra composition, they couldn’t retaliate, and let LA finish with over four minutes in the bank.
The Charge’s final defense was admirable, yet with four minutes only so much could be done to defend. The Valiant got several nice picks, and opened up the point to get a second map win.
Image courtesy of Dot Esports
The Charge began running a fun bunker defense on this map. They lost a lot of initial ground when Kariv hooked Rio off the high ground, yet the Charge did find some footing, and held firmly before the end of A; it took LA the entire rest of their time bank to open up the second segment of the map. Guangzhou swapped to Sombra 3-3, and Eileen’s EMP stabilized the defense near the beginning of B. A mistimed hack however eventually allowed Indy “SPACE” Halpern to get a double kill, allowing LA to roll into C. In the end, the Charge prevented the Valiant from completing the map, but lost a lost of ground doing so.
On the attack, triple dps was yet again the opening composition. An amazing quintuple kill from HOTBA’s Pharah opened up all of B with over 4 minutes on the clock. However, the Charge were stalled out, and a Grav from Kyle “KSF” Frandanisa and another big bomb from SPACE prevented the Charge from going to map 5 in the end.
The Charge have certainly begun to come into their own, yet it might be too little, too late. They played well, but many little mistakes and failure to change strategies midway through a game is costing them greatly. There can be no denying the Valiant are returning to former glory, and are quickly trying to climb the ranks to make up for lost ground. The Charge need to also realize it’s do or die time, and more losses will only prevent any sort of playoffs for them, be it for the stage or the season.
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