Tim "DaHanG" Fogarty came back from two maps down in today's IEM American Championships final to inflict a stunning defeat on reigning world champion Shane "rapha" Hendrixson. The EG player looked to have bottled it after heavy losses on both DM13 and T7, the latter usually his strongest map, but he came back strong on T9, ZTN and finally DM6 to claim a famous victory.
The win comes as a major upset despite "rapha's" shaky form throughout the weekend and will have spoiled the SK star's hopes for a perfect 2009. Both players aim looked a little off with the new hitboxes in play but it was a classic mistake from "rapha" which eventually tipped the game in favour of "DaHanG". With the EG player in the lead on DM6 but low on health, "rapha" wrested back control and, instead of claiming the red armour, pushed hard on the yellow only to take a rocket to the face and lose the frag and ultimately the game.
"DaHanG's" win sends shockwaves across the Quake community, with the previously untouchable "rapha" now looking very beatable again. The question already being asked is whether "DaHanG" has significantly improved or just that it was simply a weaker "rapha" than the one we saw win at QuakeCon, Cologne and Dubai. Europe's big names will have been watching closely and will have been given food for thougth ahead of the Global Finals in March. This weekend's finalists will be joined at CeBIT by Chance "Chance" Lacina and Sander "vo0" Kaasjager after the EG player claimed a 3-0 win over the ex-Painkiller star in the third/fourth place playoff.
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t9 was aight comeback
first 2 maps were boring
Even the pre-match interviews which were aired you could tell Rapha just wanted a win for the "5 lans in a row", while Dahang wanted a win to show how good he really was. Dahang didn't just win, he totally destroyed Rapha and if he can keep that up in 2010 he's in for a fantastic year.
Grats dahang ul Rapha
He out brained the "uncontested number 1" with ease on numerous occasions.
but great great play from dahang, he's the american to beat now