The International 8 has its first team coming from the regional qualifiers.
Team Serenity, who entered the Chinese regional qualifiers through the opens, defeated tier one squads LGD Forever Young and Invictus Gaming earlier today to earn a slot in Vancouver this August. Both of their victories were incredibly convincing for an open qualifier team, drawing praise from the community for their tight mechanics and teamwork.
Their first match in the qualifier playoffs went swimmingly, with a 2-0 result against LGD Forever Young. Team Serenity displayed fantastic teamfighting prowess and skill throughout the short semifinal series, reminiscent of the legendary Wings Gaming. Though they did not show the same devil-may-care attitude that Wings Gaming had when it came to drafting, their solid and decisive movement in five-on-five clashes more than made up for it.
After brushing LFY aside, Team Serenity then played three games against iG. The latter struck first in the series, completely destroying Serenity with a final score of 36-6. Every player on iG was firing on all cylinders in the first map, and quite frankly Serenity stood no chance.
Serenity bounced back in the second game in a big way, nearly matching iG’s time with their own victory of under 36 minutes. Although it wasn’t the bloodbath that the first game was, they nonetheless held iG to just 10 kills compared to their 26. Serenity sealed the deal in the final map, despite the immense game from iG’s Sun “Agressif” Zheng on his signature Phantom Lancer.
This result places both LFY and iG in the losers bracket, where they will have another chance at punching a ticket to Seattle. LFY will, however, to get through For the Dream first in the losers’ semifinal match, before going up against iG for the last available qualification slot in China. The semifinals will kick off later tonight, at 11pm CT.
Team Serenity, on the other hand, will have the luxury of a full rest from the madness that is the Chinese qualifier—though they will also have to look forward to their bootcamp period before TI8 itself rolls around.
