What should you know about Virtus.pro rivals in Hamburg

Virtus.pro G2A ended up in the same group with Team Liquid, Keen Gaming and SG e-sports in ESL One Hamburg 2017. Games will be played in GSL format; only two teams will advance to the play-offs. In the first round, Virtus.pro will face one of the Chinese underdogs – Keen Gaming.

Keen Gaming – who are these new Chinese?

KG used to play for EHOME org under the EHOME.KEEN banner. They didn't earn international Dota 2 scene's recognition yet, as the Hamburg tournament is going to be their first major event. The International 7 qualifiers were their first series in China – where they lost to LGD Gaming, one step away from Seattle.

Four out of five players arrived at the roster at the end of 2016 – start of 2017. The line-up didn't change after that – an exception from the rules surrounding academy teams. EHOME.KEEN was rebranded to a stand-alone team Keen Gaming in September of 2017, but it still belongs to EHOME.

Players and their MMR:

  • zhizhizhi - 9049
  • 荧 - unknown
  • dark - unknown
  • 佞臣 - 7361
  • rong – 7603

Despite their successful performance in TI7 qualification stage, the team wasn't granted a direct invite to the new season's Major qualifiers. Due to that, their path to ESL One Hamburg 2017 started from the open qualifiers, where they defeated both CDEC rosters and IG and ultimately beat LGD Gaming in the finals.

Jin "zhizhizhi"' Zhiyi, one of the team's players, evaded serious organization's attention for quite a long time despite maintaining top spots in the Chinese leaderboards. Viewers joked that he bought his account.

Some quick facts about KG:

  • Keen Gaming's carry “zhizhizhi” maintains 9k MMR
  • Roster's backbone is playing together since January of 2017
  • Were very close to advancing to The Kiev Major and TI7
  • Earned their tickers to Hamburg through the toughest Chinese qualifiers
  • ESL One Hamburg 2017 marks the team's first major tournament

SG e-sports – Brazil's best

SG e-sports were formed from a promising Kingao+4 mix-up. They had their names heard during The Kiev Major 2017, where they became the first ever Brazilian team in the history of Majors.

Debut Major in Kiev turned out extremely successful for SG. Despite claiming the last place in groups, Brazilians eliminated Team Secret in a first round of play-offs (2-1) and finished 5-8 overall.

Players and their MMR:

  • FuckinEh - 6940
  • 4dr - 7952
  • Liposa - 7694
  • Thiolicor - 7893
  • Bardo - unknown

Worth to note SG's latest achievements: victory in The Perfect World Masters and AMD SAPPHIRE Dota PIT League qualifiers, and 5-6 place in StarLadder i-League Invitational Season 3.