Among the teams making moves in preparation for The International 2019 qualifiers, J Storm has finalized its roster by adding veteran support player Sivatheeban “1437” Sivanathapillai.
1437 has played for teams like Cloud9, Digital Chaos, and even served as a coach for Team Secret at two separate points.
After a messy second half of the 2018-19 Dota Pro Circuit season, J Storm looked at their roster and decided to bench their captain Park “March” Tae-won and Jonathan “bryle” Santos De Guia. Both players are still on the inactive roster for the team and there is no word on if they will pursue other opportunities or continue practicing with J Storm.
While they weren’t able to make it into the EPICENTER Major, trial player Leon “Nine” Kirilin impressed the team with his play and managed to secure himself a full contract during this shuffle. Coach Jimmy “DeMoN” Ho also stepped in to play for the team during this period.
DeMoN was a veteran Dota player who spent time with the likes of Evil Geniuses and Team Liquid before he retired in 2018 and became J Storm’s coach. He will return to the coaching role after this short-lived comeback failed to make an impact for the team.
1437 will take DeMoN’s spot while Clinton “Fear” Loomis will take over as captain. Fear, who has been a key to J Storm’s success after coming over from EG, is perfect for this role since he has the experience to back up the title and is one of the longest-tenured players on the team.
The addition of 1437 gives Fear someone with just as much top-level experience to help straegize. This will also give 1437 a clean slate to work with after the mess that was the former TNC Tiger’s roster over the course of this season. Despite pairing former star players Danil “Dendi” Ishutin and Chai “Mushi” Yee Fung together on the same roster, things fell apart almost immediately.
It is shocking that 1437 waited this long to jump ship, but his return to North America could help solidify J Storm in the race for that second rank in the region. EG has dominated for so long, but this might be the first time there has been a competition for a clear second team in a few years.
The open qualifiers for TI9 will run from July 3 to 7, while the closed qualifiers start right after that, going from July 8 to 15. Only six teams will make it into TI9 through the qualifiers, one from each of the six regions.
J Storm is likely to receive an invite into the closed NA qualifier since they are currently ranked 13th, just outside of the TI9 direct invites.
Published: Jun 20, 2019 09:53 pm