Manila Major Team Preview: Wings Gaming

Not many people were aware of Wings Gaming’s skill before last month when, against all odds, the team won ESL One Manila.

This marked the realization of their main objective as since they became a competitive outfit back in 2014, the team have aspired to make a name for themselves by becoming one of the bigger Chinese teams.

Wings underwent several metamorphoses before settling on their current squad in August 2015. The long time together since then, at least in Dota 2 terms, paid off and now Wings Gaming are looking to produce another upset in the capital of the Philippines.

 

Roster

Chu “Shadow” Zeyu – position 1
Zhou “bLink” Yang – position 2
Zhang “Faith_bian” Ruida – position 3
Zhang “Innocence” Liping (c) – position 4
Li “iceice” Peng – position 5

 

Notable achievements:

ESL One Manila – 1^st

H-Cup Season 1 – 4^th (weekly tournament)

 

Current form:

May – 60.0% win rate (9 wins, 4 draws, 2 losses)

 

Top 5 most picked heroes (patch 6.87c)

 

Top 5 most banned heroes (patch 6.87c)

 

Wings had to give their all to win the ESL One in Manila. The tournament didn’t start well for them as they lost their opening game to compLexity Gaming. Despite this, Wings recovered to win the best-of-three encounter 2-1 and followed this up with a second 2-1 win against the same opponents to progress to the knockout stages.

Having eliminated Fnatic in the semi-finals, the team arrived at the Grand Finals as underdogs, but contrary to all expectations, the Chinese outfit dominated their match against Team Liquid, securing a clean 3-0 victory. This was all the more surprising as Wings had lost to Liquid 2-0 in the Group Stage.

In Manila, the team impressed with their resilience, having won three best-of-three matches from being a game behind. These included their first and second matches in the Group Stage against compLexity as well as the semi-final against Fnatic. The other major strength for Wings Gaming was their ability to study their opponents and adapt their tactics as after losing 2-0 to Team Liquid in the Group Stage, the Chinese outfit were more than prepared for the Grand Finals encounter with them.

Wings’ main strength is their teamplay, which they rely upon more than a single playmaker or a player with a superior skill level. The captain Innocence recently admitted in an interview that he feels he has the freedom to pick whichever strategies he finds most suitable because he has the full support and backing of the team. He is greatly aided in this task by the wide range of heroes that his team-mates can play.

Wings Gaming also like to employ a pushing style and their large hero pool allows them to go for counter picking strategies during the draft phase.

Both Shadow and bLink are highly rated farmers and team players. bLink is an excellent Invoker player, whose sunstrikes are pinpoint lethal. Alchemist quickly turns into a gold-making machine when put in the hands of these two. Both of them had a chance to play this hero at ESL One Manila and both averaged above 1000GPM. It is therefore unsurprising that this hero is the second most banned hero against Wings Gaming with 21 (after Bounty Hunter with 26 bans). Wings Gaming also use Beastmaster as one of their most popular picks in the current meta when given the chance.

The Support duo of Witch Doctor and Io proved successful deployments during the team’s first visit to Manila and Wings still like to use them. Wings’ unpredictability and unconventional picks (e.g. Keeper of the Light) were also a huge headache for their opposition.

Wings Gaming will arrive in Manila for the second time with pleasant memories and will be looked upon with respect from the other teams. However, the opposition will be prepared and Wings will have to take their gaming to the next level if they want to achieve something significant again.

Dafabet will be providing competitive odds on The Manila Major.