The second heat and finals
While the final first heat matches were taking place, the teams for the afternoon’s heat were arriving, meaning that things were pretty crowded. In the back room there was hardly room to breathe as two playing teams, some spectators and teams waiting to play watched the action unfold, but soon it was their turn as another four hopeful teams took up their mice and readied themselves for a fight.
The second heat consisted of Casual5, esu.MIX, mEx and the qualifier favourites, Unicon. This last team were hotly tipped as being the guys to rule the roost at the qualifiers and to turn in a respectable performance at the finals.
So the first round of the second heat kicked off and mEx showed esu.MIX how de_dust2 should be played with a thorough 23-7 trouncing. Taking a stroll over to catch the end of the Casual5 vs. Unicon match was something of a shock as Unicon were having a hard time and eventually lost 17-13 to Casual5… suddenly the favourites were in trouble.
With two wins crucial in the rounds to go through to the semis, Unicon HAD to win their next two matches to stand a chance of getting in, so the crowds were gathered as Unicon faced esu.MIX who were still smarting from their 23-7 defeat. mEx were up against the team of the moment, Casual5, though they sadly proved to have had their moment and went down 21-9 to mEx. Not that anybody was watching to closely as Unicon were again in trouble on the de_cbble map. esu.MIX’s defeat had certainly spurred them on and though Unicon fought bravely they didn’t live up to their reputation letting esu.MIX sneak a 16-14 win, putting the favourites out of the tournament!
Unicon must have been having a bad day as the third round, which was an anti-climax after the drama of the second saw them pull a draw with mEx on de_nuke. Meanwhile esu.MIX, riding high on their previous victory walked it home with an 18-12 win over Casual5. The final round saw mEx and esu.MIX through into the semis to join PPHS and Pulse.
As is the tradition with semis, teams from one heat are drawn to play a team from the other so we saw PPHS face off against esu.MIX and mEx take on Pulse. The high standard of play was now showing with some involved matches and tense showdowns leading to mEx seeing off Pulse 16-14 and esu.MIX presenting the same scoreline against PPHS.
So the teams from the first heats now faced each other for that coveted 3rd place slot to go to the UK finals while the two second heat teams, mEx and esu.MIX, having now qualified could really just use their match to get the measure of each other.
This last match for Pulse and PPHS couldn’t have gone closer to the wire with both teams scoring 15 apiece forcing an overtime round of five games. Finally, Pulse cracked first and PPHS took 4 off of them to go 16-19 up overall and win through to the UK finals in third place. Just to make sure that everyone there knew they were in top form, mEx took esu.MIX to town and showed them a 16-8 win, putting them top of the heap for the event.
All in all, a good day’s gaming with everything smoothly and some real nail biting moments. It was a bit of a shock to see Unicon go down with barely a fight, but at the same time, watching mEx rise to the top and the tension in the final match between Pulse and PPHS was something to be seen. Many thanks to all those who took part and thanks to Simon and Derek for the venue. I’ll be brining you more from ACON5 at the UK finals and LAN party from 22nd-24th April.
