Nigma got punished by Virtus.pro for their stubbornness of playing four protect one in a meta where early objectives and team fights are favored by most of the teams.
Game one featured an Amer “Miracle-” Al-Barkawi Naga Siren, which was the only winning condition for Nigma. Their big team fights combos were reliant on the rather big cooldown Egg of Phoenix, while VP were constantly looking for fights with an offlane Pangolier, a carry Ember Spirit and mid lane Zeus with a 19 minute Boots of Travel completed. The game was dragged to past the 40 minute mark courtesy of a couple of disengages with the Naga ultimate, but, unfortunately for Nigma, VP’s Enigma played by Bakyt “Zayac” Emilzhanov farmed his way from position to a monster that eventually slayed the Europeans.
For game two Nigma tried something similar, however, they had, at least in theory, a better pushing lineup with Ivan “MinD_ContRoL” Ivanov on Nature’s Prophet. But, their game tempo was dependent on a mid lane Alchemist, who got crushed by Vladimir “No[o]ne” Minenko. While the mid was totally lost, MC couldn’t make a big impact alone as VP had very good creep wave clearing with Axe, Keeper of the Light and a carry Bristtleback. The game closed in 24 minute with the Alchemist fourth in the networth charts, behind Bristle, Void Spirit and Axe.
The 2-0 loss from today pushes Nigma to fourth place in Group A, with just one series remaining to be played for them in the group stage. Their last adversaries are vikin.gg and a loss against them might spell disaster for Nigma, as only the top four teams from each group will make the cut to the playoffs.
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