This game is has two potential endings. 1) South Korea stomps them and everyone's assumptions about this game are right, or 2) Some how Australia is able to make everything work perfectly and sneak out of the quarterfinal at Blizzcon with a win. Yes r/cow, I know number 2 is very unlikely but please let a fan dream. All I want is for close and intense games but maybe I'm going too far with this... I'm sure you'll let me know. The hope for a close game has brought me to believe that if Australia has these three things going for them they will be able to squeak into the semi-finals.
1) The post about South Korea actually being unprepared needs to be true. Australia has a chance if they are able to exploit their allegedly unprepared opponent and expose flaws in their strategies. This South Korean team is a different one then the group stages after they added Fleta and Fury in place of Saebyeolbe and Meko so they don't have the experience of playing together in the group stage. They also haven't been able to scrim as a full team very often because, according to the link above, Fate and Fury have had a lot of engagements with their OWL teams or have been scrimming with 200 ping. Having a tank duo that is out of sync can be detrimental to a teams success. We saw throughout OWL Season 1 that tank play, though it's not flashy, is very important. Yes, they are both top 5 in their role in the world. But this is a point to the Aussies if the post above is true.
2) Hus and ckm need to play out of their minds. Australia need Hus to be cosistently hitting easy headshots. In Australias game against China there was one spot in particular where China's push could've been ground to a halt by an easy headshot, and you can't let these opportunities pass against South Korea. The kill on the rezing Mercy would add an extra 10 second to at least to China's push and if you give that to South Korea they are going to exploit it. The Aussies also need to lean on ckm's Pharah because it is likely that South Korea runs GOATS (3-3) due to their previously mentioned lack of practice time. GOATS is fairly simple to play but a Pharah can hinder the ability for opposing teams to push.
3) The final thing that Australia need to do to have a chance of winning against South Korea is to throw strange strategies at them to keep them off balance. Gunba is a great coach and now is his time to show us what he can do. The combination of having a lack of scrim time and throwing irregular strategies at Korea will lead to messy communication, an inability to have a fixed defence and will create holes between their tank and support lines. In an all or nothing game like this one, the Aussies need to do something weird to win. In a straight up match the South Koreans will win 19/20 times but they can move the odds in their favor with smart coaching and unexpected strategies.
In Overwatch anyone can win, that's just a fact, and Australia needs to actually believe in themselves to win. They have a good team with OWL level talent and players we will see in the league within the next 1-2 years. They have a lot of potential and are in the beginning stages of realizing that potential and coming close to or actually beating South Korea would show the world that.
Twitter: @amos_calder
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