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Team Dignitas’ HGC Preview: Week 5
Week 4 was an amazing weekend for Team Dignitas. With their 2 wins, they qualified for the Western Clash at IEM Katowice in Poland in March. There is only one more week left of League play for stage one and for those teams that have already qualified, these last games will be important for optimal seeding into the Western Clash tournament.
Let’s recap some of the things we saw in Week 4. Team Liquid was the first team to take a game off of Team Dignitas. In Game 2 Team Dignitas made a few mistakes with rotations and shotcalling that Team Liquid was able to capitalize on. Even with the loss of the second game, Team Dignitas bounced back very quickly to dominate the next two games and take the series 3-1. Team Dignitas showed their ability to pull off a triple Warrior composition with Tyrael, Dehaka, and Blaze. By also drafting Cassia and Kharazim they didn’t struggle with dealing damage.
The series against Fnatic was definitely just as surprising as the series against Team Liquid. It wasn’t expected that Team Liquid could take a game off of Team Dignitas, but they managed to do it. Fnatic, on the other hand, wasn’t even able to take one map and Team Dignitas won the series with a clean 3-0. Fnatic looked like they struggled quite a bit but even with this loss, they are still qualified for the Western Clash. In an interview after the game, Joshua “Snitch” Bennett mentioned that the Team Dignitas strategy for facing Fnatic was to take away Fnatic’s Diablo, making it a new pocket-pick for Team Dignitas that Fnatic would likely not expect.
This strategy definitely seemed to unravel Fnatic's draft and play throughout the games. Blaze was also an important staple to the Team Dignitas drafts, as expected. And once again we saw a triple Warrior composition from Team Dignitas, this time featuring E.T.C., Blaze, and Tyrael, with Tracer and Malfurion to join them.
Team Dignitas vs. Zealots - Friday, February 16th at 9:00 am PST / 6:00 pm CET
It’s hard to ignore the huge improvements in the hero pool of captain Snitch over the past year. From struggling to find his place on the team, to becoming the definition of the Flex role, Snitch has proved himself to be a phenomenal player and team leader. Just this season alone, he has played 12 different heroes. From Greymane to Medivh to E.T.C., Snitch gives Team Dignitas complete flexibility in their drafts.
As for the Flex role for Zealots, Adrian “adrd” Wojcik is not far behind. While he has mostly focused on Tassadar, Hanzo, and Medivh this season, he is known for busting out the odd non-meta pick. Like Snitch, he can play whatever the team needs him to fill. Team Dignitas have only played Medivh once so far and that was in Week 4 of HGC, while Zealots have been relying on the hero a lot more. There might be tension between these two teams when it comes to Genji and Hanzo in the draft, as they are both still first-pick first-ban staples for many teams in HGC.
Zealots currently stand tied with Tricked Esport and Team Liquid with 3-3 W-L records. They won their 5 game series against Fnatic and have looked very good against the other mid-range EU teams. They will be fighting especially hard in this series to increase their chance of going to the Western Clash. Team Dignitas will have to keep on their toes to make sure they stay strong to their draft and rotation styles. Winning here will give them better seeding into the Western Clash.
This is the last Team Dignitas game for a while until the Western Clash. Join the Dig community is our #DIGscord this Friday as we watch the boys play against Zealots. Tweet out to the team and let them know you're rooting for them with those #DIGWIN hashtags!
Team Dignitas Discord Server: https://discord.gg/uSfWk3T