Tundra holds off Yandex, wins ESL One Birmingham

For more than an hour, it appeared as if Team Yandex would get its revenge on Tundra Esports in the best way possible.

Then the clock struck midnight.

Despite dropping the first map and needing more than an hour to survive the second, Tundra beat Yandex 3-1 Sunday to win the ESL One Birmingham event in England.

The win came a day after Tundra swept Yandex 2-0 in the upper-bracket final to advance to the grand final and force Yandex into a do-or-die lower-bracket final to begin Sunday.

The $1 million Dota 2 tournament, featuring 16 teams, awarded $750,000 in prize money and $250,000 in club rewards as well as 35,460 ESL Pro Tour points spread among all participants.

The competition, part of DreamHack Birmingham, began with a group stage, with teams split into two groups of eight. The top two teams from each group advanced to the upper bracket of the playoffs. The third- and fourth-place teams were delegated to the lower-bracket playoffs, with the remaining eight teams eliminated.

Yandex began the day with a 2-1 win over Xtreme Gaming in that lower-bracket final. Yandex took the first map in 41 minutes, dropped the second in 34 minutes, then took the winner-take-all third map in 34 minutes. Yandex was on red all three maps.

Ilya "CHIRA_JUNIOR" Chirtsov of Russia paced Yandex with a 26/15/29 kill/death/assist ratio in the win. China's Wang "Ame" Chunyu posted a 22/12/22 K/D/A in the loss.

In the grand final, Yandex continued the momentum with a 41-minute on green. In the next map, Tundra and Yandex battled for more than an hour before Tundra emerged with a 62-minute win on green. The next two maps combined barely lasted longer than the second map, with Tundra taking the third in 38 minutes on red and 28 minutes on green to take the match and the title.

After a quiet first map, Bozhidar "bzm" Bogdanov of Bulgaria led Tundra in kills in each of the victorious maps, finishing with a 46/15/53 K/D/A.

Alimzhan "watson" Islambekov of Kazakhstan posted a 37/16/32 to lead Yandex in defeat.

ESL One Birmingham final standings / prize pool (prize money, club reward)

1. $250,000, $40,000 -- Tundra Esports

2. $100,000, $30,000 -- Team Yandex

3. $80,000, $25,000 -- Xtreme Gaming

4. $60,000, $20,000 -- PARIVISION

5-6. $40,000, $15,000 -- Team Spirit, Aurora Gaming

7-8. $27,500, $12,500 -- MOUZ, Team Falcons

9-10. $20,000, $10,000 -- GamerLegion, Virtus.pro

11-12. $17,500, $10,000 -- BetBoom Team, paiN Gaming

13-14. $15,000, $10,000 -- Yakult Brothers, OG

15-16. $10,000, $10,000 -- REKONIX, Nigma Galaxy

--Field Level Media