Wild Rift Horizon Cup: Chinese teams EDG, TTG defeat Southeast Asian SBTC, Team Secret
Chinese teams Da Kun Gaming (DKG) and ThunderTalk Gaming (TTG) defeated Vietnam’s Sống Bằng Tình Cảm Esports (SBTC) and the Philippines’ Team Secret (TS), respectively, in the opening stage of the League of Legends: Wild Rift Horizon Cup 2021 over last weekend.
DKG 2:0 SBTC
Tournament favorite DKG faced SBTC in the Horizon Cup Group Stage, playing a best-of-three match. SBTC decided to play aggressively in the first game, luring DKG into team fights.
DKG, however, played smart and went for a split push approach, diverting the opponents’ attention from their focus on the map’s objectives by engaging them through small skirmishes.
DKG midlaner Huiba’s pick Jax snowballed and quickly annihilated the enemy’s turrets, giving his team early access to SBTC’s top lane. DKG won the game in only 16 minutes.
SBTC looked like they were ready to retaliate in the second game, claiming the first Rift Herald and Dragon. Hồ “Akeno” Trung Hậu carried SBTC with his Rakan thanks to the champ’s crowd control abilities that helped the team secure kills.
Akeno, however, was singled out during team fights, and DKG managed to turn the tables nearing the end of the game, en route to a 17-minute and defeated SBTC 2-0.
TTG 2:1 Secret
TTG defeated Secret 2-1 after in the third series of the Horizon Cup’s opening day. Robert “Trebor” Mansilungan’s Lee Sin and James “Hamezz” Santos’ Nami led Secret to an 18-minute win in game one, but TTG’s midlaner Tianhua “Z” Zhou and jungler “Christ” led their team to steal victory in game two.
Z’s and Christ’s unforgiving pokes kept the Filipino team busy. As the opponents struggled hard to find an engagement in their favor, TTG secured the objectives and forced their way to a 17-minute victory, bringing the series into a third round.
In a decisive game three, Secret was leading early on, winning the map objectives and pushing out the top and bottom lanes. However, Christ stole the Baron when Secret was fighting the objective and swung the momentum in TTG’s favor.
The Chinese team then headed to the Drake and took it as well. They then took this opportunity to strike back and left Secret far behind, defeating them in team fights. TTG then destroyed Secret’s Nexus after minute 17.
What’s next for Southeast Asia?
It is no doubt that Southeast Asia had a rough start in the Horizon Cup. However, Secret and SBTC still have four more days in the group to atone for their mistakes. Both teams are set to face three more opponents. Winning against those three teams is sufficient to guarantee them a spot in the Knockout Stage.
The Group Stage matches are going until 17 November, with the teams competing in a single round-robin of best-of-three matches. The top three teams in each group will advance to the Knockout stage, running from 19 to 21 November, and the bottom two will be eliminated.
The best team of each group will then automatically proceed to the semi-finals of the Knockout Stage. Meanwhile, the second and third-placed teams in each group are set to begin the main event in the first round. It was announced that the Knockout Stage matchups would all be best-of-five — excluding the Grand Finals, which will be a best-of-seven series.
