TI14 Team Preview: Tundra Esports are the European Juggernauts

It was a pretty bold move for Tundra Esports to enter the Dota 2 scene in early 2021, back when LAN events hadn’t even resumed yet after the COVID-19 pandemic.  Even bolder still, the ownership signed the 2021 roster to long term contracts that same year, locking the players down for three years until 2024. The world, including the esports industry as a whole, had not seen a crisis on that kind of global scale in modern times — forcing tournament organizers to suspend in-person events. Everything moved online, which meant that true international competition had to wait.

It’s safe to say that the faith has paid off big time over the entirety of the team’s existence. For one, it only took them about a year and a half since forming the squad to win The International in 2022 (TI11). It was with a slightly different roster, mind you, but not different enough to take anything away from how quick the turnaround was.

Mind the game

If there’s anything that Tundra’s TI11 run taught us, it’s that the brightest minds in Dota 2 reside in this organization. They were about the only team in Singapore that realized just how busted Wraith Pact — an item that has since been removed entirely from the game — truly was. It was somewhat reminiscent of OG’s second straight title run at TI9, where they found a broken strategy in the form of carry Io and played it way better than anyone else could.

Sure, some of the members from then are no longer with the team, but the sort of genius-level intellect Tundra are now known for still remains here. Neta “33” Shapira and Martin “Saksa” Sazdov comprise the remnants of the TI11-winning lineup, and their generational understanding of the game shines through to this day.

So what do you get when you surround such smart Dota players with mechanical monsters like Bozhidar “bzm” Bogdanov and Matthew “Whitemon” Filemon? You get a squad that is a threat to win any top level event at any given time. In fact, they won three such tournaments this year alone, and have come within inches of winning those that they didn’t take first place in.

Rolling in it

All in all, they’ve bagged almost $2 million in prize money this season — and this is even through two roster changes in between. Remco “Crystallis” Arets wasn’t even on the roster until last March, when he replaced the outgoing Anton “dyrachyo” Shkredov who decided to take a break from competitive play.

This is just a testament to the rest of the team’s consistency and stability despite shifting tides. For as long as 33, Saksa, and Whitemon are around, it almost seems like who else plays alongside them doesn’t matter; they find ways to run rival clubs over anyway. They might not win everything in sight, but when it comes to premier Dota 2 events, you can always expect them to show up in the top 4 at the very least.

That includes TI14, of course. Come next week, it wouldn’t be shocking to see them top the Swiss group stage or come in second or third there. Once the playoffs roll in, I expect them to win the whole damn thing. This isn’t to say that anything less would be an abject disaster, but given their form this season, taking them out of the title conversation would be extremely disrespectful.

Elephant in the room

On that note, it is important to address one glaring weakness in this squad, at the risk of annoying my fellow Hotspawn Dota writer Owen. I know this is contradictory to what I just said about consistency in the previous section, but Crystallis is somewhat of a wildcard for Tundra. On one hand, the results speak for themselves. Crystallis was there when they won BLAST Slam 3, and he was also there when they nearly beat Team Tidebound at Clavision Masters.

But on the other, he sometimes tends to far and away be the worst player on this roster. It does indeed get bad enough to the point where his performances drag the rest of the squad down — into a hole that not even a two-time TI winner like 33 or a young hotshot like bzm can get them out of.

The most recent example of this is their second semifinal game against Team Falcons at the Esports World Cup, where he was a complete non-factor as carry Doom. bzm and 33 were doing so much heavy lifting in that game — but just couldn’t rescue such a poor showing from Crystallis.

So yes, in some cases it does come down to which version of him shows up in any given game. Will we get Crystallis? Daedalus? Blades of Attack? Tundra’s ceiling is theoretically limitless, but capped by the 50-50 in question.

Player to watch

It’s 33, without a single doubt. This man is a Dota savant. If you need someone to raise your team’s ceiling and floor simultaneously, 33 is your guy.

He is equal parts cerebral and stylish, and is the epitome of what it means to be an impactful offlaner.

Biggest challenge

I dedicated an entire section to it already, but Crystallis needs to tap into the right parts of his skillset and not get in his own head if this organization is to win a second Aegis of Champions. Coach David “MoonMeander” Tan Boon Yang should step in and keep his head in the game if things start going awry for him.

Team grade

A rather easy A goes to Tundra Esports for the talent and consistency present here. The results this season back it all up, too. They have a chink in their armor in the carry position as I’ve mentioned, but if Crystallis can stay level-headed, the sky is the limit for them.