Earlier DOTALAND reported on a new Chinese Dota 2 club — New Element Gaming. Now check out this short interview with their manager Tony…
Q: Hello Tony, thank you for the interview, say hi to everyone~
NE.Tony: Hello everyone, I am Tony, currently the manager of NE Club, and occasionally also cameo as a commentator on the Sina Cup.
Q: NE is a fairly new entity to viewers, so can you describe the club’s situation for us again?
NE.Tony: Our club was founded in August of this year, and the team house is currently in Shanghai. Of our five players, there are three who have only begun playing Dota 2 this July. These three are previously top 10 players on the Dota 1 ladder: Shiki, Longlong （龙龙）, and Zcd. The other two are our support players and have played Dota 2 for a long time: the 4 is our oldest player, Wil (上头是常态, a name that followers of high level Chinese Dota 2 pubs will be familiar with), and our role 5 is our lovely Shana.
Even though no one has prior experience playing professionally, we’re all very united and work hard together to practice and build teamwork. The team has been scrimming together now for nearly three months, and have participated in some online events, the results of which have been average.
Q: NE has advanced in the current Sina Cup, yet you still say they’ve only played average, why is this?
NE.Tony: In my opinion, the players’ individual ability is pretty good. They’re all fairly calm players and don’t easily tilt, even though Wil’s [Chinese ID] would suggest the opposite! Their weakness is that they’ve come to Dota 2 relatively late, and are lacking in execution. Their playing style doesn’t have any particularly unique aspect, and also isn’t specifically rigid.
Q: The Sina Supernova Cup has gathered second-tier and new teams from across China; you guys probably scrim with these teams pretty often, who do you think are the strongest amongst this group?
NE.Tony: Amongst the ones we often scrim with, everyone’s probably around the same level, but I do think that ForLove and DT Club are a bit stronger.
Q: In appearing as a caster for this Sina Cup, you’ve made a small comeback since fading from the public eye a bit after the last G-1 season, how does that feel?
NE.Tony: G-1 was actually my first major event casting experience, so thanks to G-1 and 17173 for the opportunity and learning chance. For casting Sina Cup I made a lot of preparations, and because I’d become pretty familiar with all the participating teams, along with watching my team scrim and compete, so the main challenges in casting here aren’t issues for me. I hope to get everyone’s support, but will everyone still like me even without my amazing hair from G-1?
Q: Without that hair, it will indeed seem like something is missing. When will we see its triumphant return?
NE.Tony: Wait ’til my hair reaches my waist, we shall meet at TI 1006.
Q: Okay let’s talk a bit about tonight’s match (this match has since been played), your opponents HGT are also a new team, how well do you know them?
NE.Tony: We’re something of a sibling team, we scrim with them quite a bit, and the players all know each other pretty well now.
Q: Since you know each other so well, then how about a simple prediction of odds?
NE.Tony: 50/50, in scrims we both win and lose, so for the match it’ll depend on execution and performance as well as pre-match preparations.
Q: Once again, thanks Tony for the interview, you get the last word.
NE.Tony: Thank you for the interview, and I hope new teams can all achieve good results, and for everyone to lend their support to NE.
DOTALAND.net 