The much delayed ESL Major Series Semi-Final between
SK Gaming and
Wizards finally took place last night.
Round 1
Bans: Vladimir, Sona, Alistar, Warwick, TF, Irelia
Picks: Rumble, Amumu + Vayne, Nunu + Soraka, Janna + Anivia, Jarvan + Cait, Jax
SK Gaming went into the matches brimming with confidence after playing some of their best play to date the day before. This confidence served them little good however in the first match as Wizards took the first match in 35 minutes.
A strong support performance by
Aarón 'Babeta' Bernabeu saw him involved in 11 of his teams 14 kills.
Round 2
First Pick and Ban -> SK
Bans: Vladimir, Sona, Jax, Warwick, Rumble, Amumu
Picks: Vayne, Irelia + Alistar, Taric + Nunu, Ashe + TF, Brand + Udyr, Evelynn
The second match saw SK return to their form from the previous day, this one last 33 minutes and saw
Carlos 'ocelote' Rodríguez Santiago give a dominant performance on Brand.
Some poor focus by Wizards saw them opting to target
Mike 'Wickd' Petersen in some of the team fights. As Wickd was on Udyr, he negated most of their damage.
This coupled with Wizards opting to pick Evelynn who proved to be an unwise pick as Ocelote could practically one-shot her.
The score ended up at 24-11 and saw us go down to a third and final game to determine who would be the EMS finalist.
Round 3
First Pick and Ban -> WIZ
Bans: Sona, Vladimir, Warwick, Jax, Nunu, TF
Picks: Vayne, Rumble + Amumu, Jarvan + Janna, Caitlyn + Soraka, Karthus + Anivia, Irelia
The third and final game was the closest of the three and lasted the longest at 46 minutes.
Just how close this game was becomes evident as you look at the final kill score of 24-24.
In an epically close game you can see that either one of these teams could have gone into the EMS final. A sign of the strength of the new SK line-up is the ability for several players to carry the team.
In the last game it was Ocelote, this time SK were carried by
Adrian 'Candy Panda' Wübbelmann who proved why he has the reputation of the #1 AD carry in the EU.
He finished with a score of 13-5-3 and 330 cs on Caitlyn.
The fact that Candy was so fed may have had an influence on the final result as the kills were more evenly spread on the Wizards team.
This result meant that SK took the tie with a 2-1 score line and will now face
Team SoloMid in the Grand Final where SK will look to win back-to-back ESL Major Series titles.


Round 1
Bans: Vladimir, Sona, Alistar, Warwick, TF, Irelia
Picks: Rumble, Amumu + Vayne, Nunu + Soraka, Janna + Anivia, Jarvan + Cait, Jax
SK Gaming went into the matches brimming with confidence after playing some of their best play to date the day before. This confidence served them little good however in the first match as Wizards took the first match in 35 minutes.
A strong support performance by

Round 2
First Pick and Ban -> SK
Bans: Vladimir, Sona, Jax, Warwick, Rumble, Amumu
Picks: Vayne, Irelia + Alistar, Taric + Nunu, Ashe + TF, Brand + Udyr, Evelynn
The second match saw SK return to their form from the previous day, this one last 33 minutes and saw

Some poor focus by Wizards saw them opting to target

This coupled with Wizards opting to pick Evelynn who proved to be an unwise pick as Ocelote could practically one-shot her.
The score ended up at 24-11 and saw us go down to a third and final game to determine who would be the EMS finalist.
Round 3
First Pick and Ban -> WIZ
Bans: Sona, Vladimir, Warwick, Jax, Nunu, TF
Picks: Vayne, Rumble + Amumu, Jarvan + Janna, Caitlyn + Soraka, Karthus + Anivia, Irelia
The third and final game was the closest of the three and lasted the longest at 46 minutes.
Just how close this game was becomes evident as you look at the final kill score of 24-24.
In an epically close game you can see that either one of these teams could have gone into the EMS final. A sign of the strength of the new SK line-up is the ability for several players to carry the team.
In the last game it was Ocelote, this time SK were carried by

He finished with a score of 13-5-3 and 330 cs on Caitlyn.
The fact that Candy was so fed may have had an influence on the final result as the kills were more evenly spread on the Wizards team.
This result meant that SK took the tie with a 2-1 score line and will now face


aBhorsen
eSports coordinator at Riot Games
SK Gaming - League of Legends Team Manager + Editor
SK Gaming Nov '10 - May 2012.
http://www.twitter.com/aBhorsenn
Events attended:
Insomnia 33-40
IEM Global Challenge Gamescom, Cologne 2011
IEM Global Challenge Kiev
MLG Anaheim
DreamHack Summer '12
ECC Poland, Warsaw
Season 2 Regionals, Gamescom
Season 2 World Championships, Los Angeles
Tales of the Lane, Paris
DreamHack Winter '12
IEM Cologne '12
IEM Katowice
S3 EU Qualifiers, Warsaw
IEM World Championship '13, CeBIT
EU LCS road trip: Lille
Riot S3 EU Summer Promotion
All-Star Shanghai 2013
OGN OLYMPUS Champions Spring
LCS Tenerife
Gamescom 2013
S3 World Championships, L.A


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