Virtus Pro and Team Secret set to clash at The Chongqing Major

Following an intense single-elimination round, the upper bracket action at The Chongqing Major continued when Virtus Pro took on LGD Gaming.

The current top-ranked team in the Dota Pro Circuit looked rock solid all the way through groups and took care of business against a dangerous Evil Geniuses squad in the first round of the playoffs. Similarly, LGD went nearly undefeated in their own group and bested Vici Gaming to reach the second round.

Both teams were ready to go at each other at full strength. That is, until it was announced that Alexei “Solo” Berezin, the captain of Virtus, was going to be kept out of the competition due to severe flu-like symptoms.

Solo being kept out was followed by another interesting announcement, that Virtus’ coach Arsenij “ArsZeeqq” Usov was going to be stepping into the active roster to help his team compete. That move looked like it was going to hurt Virtus’ chance at advancing in the upper bracket, but that didn’t end up being the case.

Both teams were very aggressive early on, picking each other off as the laning stage continued to develop. It remained even for most of the match, but LGD suffered from many of the trades they made during those team fights, letting Virtus build a little momentum.

The match went on for over 50 minutes, going to down to the very last minutes as LGD failed to defend their last few structures and Virtus secured the first win of the series.

Game two looked promising in the early stage for LGD, but Virtus was looking to draw them into fights from the start. It took about half the match for things to hit and when they did the pressure Virtus put on LGD as they kept dragging them into conflicts was intense.

With a 44-24 advantage, Virtus walked away with the 2-0 victory following a masterful execution during mid-game. Following the game, ArsZeeqq posted about his thoughts on having to step in.

The final game of the day pit the streaking EHOME against the always solid Team Secret.

Secret opened up with a dominating performance, never once letting EHOME build any kind of staying power as they blasted them out of the gates. It was 18-8 in kills and 7-1 in towers taken by the end of the game, giving Secret an easy 1-0 lead.

Instead of panicking, EHOME composed themselves before game two began, and then proceeded to give Secret the fight of their life.

From the start, EHOME came out and pressured Secret into playing a slower, more paced game – something Secret wasn’t looking to do. It ended up helping the Chinese team control the laning phase and hold good positioning moving on in the match.

Secret played from behind for almost the entire game, but that didn’t stop them from executing where they needed to in order to get themselves back in the game. EHOME didn’t respond well to Secret sticking close despite the situation and ended up buckling in the final minutes of a close game and dropping the series.

With that victory, Secret secured their spot in the upper bracket finals—where they will face Virtus in a rematch from both the upper bracket finals and grand finals of The Kuala Lumpur Major. A rematch that could very well decide the rankings going forward in the DPC due to Virtus being ranked first and Secret sitting at second.

That rematch won’t happen until Jan. 25, but Vici Gaming and Chaos Esports Club play Jan. 22 at 8pm CT to start the next day of competition.