Team SMG Welcomes MidOne and kpii

You’ve probably never heard of Team SMG. And for good reason. This is a no-name organization from Southeast Asia. But at the start of 2021, they brought in 5 players and only one of them is unknown. The other 4 are either good or absolute legends: Mushi, ah fu, MidOne, and kpii.

Superstars

These are the 4 superstars of Team SMG.

MidOne

MidOne started his career at Fnatic, back in 2015. His most important result with this team came at The International 2016, where he finished 4^th. Then followed the glory years he spent competing for Team Secret. During this time, MidOne won several Majors, finished 4^th at The International 2019 and got numerous other trophies and top 3 results.

As a midlaner, MidOne is known to be one of the best in the world. Regionally, he’s always been among the first to breach new MMR barriers such as 8000, 9000, and 10,000. In terms of playstyle, MidOne loves to play Ember, Invoker, Outworld Devourer and many other heroes. His versatility and mastery are well-known and top teams are always interested in his services.

The reason why he ended up playing for SMG is simple: after leaving Secret at the end of 2019, MidOne joined OG and for the most part struggled to get important results. The final straw was the team’s failure during the first season of Dota Pro Circuit 2021. OG missed the ONE Esports Singapore Major and decided to make a roster change. MidOne was dropped.

kpii

Like MidOne, kpii also has a great story. He first became well-known in 2015. He was playing for MVP Phoenix back then and he managed to finish 7^th – 8^th at TI 5. Then came a few years full of glorious results with Newbee. The most important of these results was the 2^nd place he got at The International 2017. After Newbee, kpii spent one year at Mineski and then a year and a half at TNC Predator. With TNC, his greatest performance was the trophy he won at MDL Chengdu Major.

Mushi

Mushi needs no introduction. The 30 year old veteran finished in the top 4 at The International 3 times and is one of the most famous SEA players in the history of Dota 2. The only problem is that we haven’t seen him compete at the top level since 2018-2019. So it’s not yet clear how much is left of the superstar he once was.

ah fu

ah fu became famous thanks to his TI 7 and TI 9 performance. At the first of these tournaments he finished 3^rd with LGD.Forever Young, while at the second one he finished 7^th – 8^th with Royal Never Give Up. Without a doubt, his skills as a support player are quite impressive and we have yet to see what he can do for Team MSG.

Team SMG’s Regional Chances

Team SMG will have quite a bit of competition in Southeast Asia. And before they can start to play in the Dota Pro Circuit, they will need to survive the Open Qualifiers. The Upper Division is still a pipe dream. But assuming they will get there at some point, their rivals will be Neon Esports, Fnatic, T1, TNC Predator, and other good teams.

At the recent ONE Esports Singapore Major we’ve seen just how strong Neon is as a tier 1 competitor. Fnatic is also quite strong, even though they pale in comparison to the other tier 1 teams. So SMG will have a very hard time qualifying for anything important. Unless of course they synergize well and train non-stop for at least 6-12 months.

 

Photo credit: Valve