Throughout the year Manuel 'GrubbY' Schenkhuizen has had top three placements at Extreme Masters, Blizzard Worldwide Invitational, World E-sports Masters and WAR3League, but until today he was yet to earn gold at an intercontinental event.

Four years on from what is arguably the birth place of Grubby’s illustrious career, World Cyber Games 2004, the Dutchman proves he still has championship potential in him by beating Jae Ho 'Moon' Jang two to one in a spectacular 2008 grand finals match.

A Warcraft match rarely gets bigger than Moon versus Grubby, but there was more on the line today than a gold medal. Grubby was competing to join Sky as one of only two players to hold two WCG Warcraft titles, while Moon was competing to bring Korea its first definitive WCG victory.

The first match took place on Turtle Rock which is favourable more so for night elf than for orc. Moon set the tone for the matches early on with a swift maneuver, trapping Grubby in his own base with a shadow melded archer, setting the audience up for a micro intensive series of matches.

Grubby pulled out ahead after setting up an expansion and hitting Moon’s base repeatedly to throw him off. The Dutchman started to flaunt a commanding lead over teammate Moon, which gradually began to slip away as Moon’s harassment minimized the usefulness of Grubby’s expansion, while repeated raider kills kept the population margin tight.

A battle broke out in the center of the map where Moon dropped most of Grubby’s units to low HP, forcing him to back off. Moon seized his opportunity and pressed Grubby’s base. With so many low HP units Grubby was unable to hold Moon back effectively. Moon had come back from the dead to secure the first map.

Map two was on Secret Valley where Grubby came out swinging, scoring three Demon Hunter surrounds in as many minutes, eventually costing Moon his town portal. Fans literally leapt out of their seats at one point, screaming for Grubby to move his Blademaster which had auto-attacked an ancient of war while backing away from a fight, eventually getting away with only 1 HP.

Grubby’s early surrounds paid off when he caught Moon without a town portal, enabling him to do significant damage before backing away.

Both players’ initial mines collapsed allowing the night elf to take the lead after expanding with his tree of eternity, at no extra cost.. The two engaged one another by Moon’s expansion where, in the heat of battle, Moon lost both his Demon Hunter and Beastmaster, leaving Grubby a clear path to destroy Moon’s entangled goldmine. Moon used the last of his gold to revive his heroes at the tavern, but Grubby’s hero levels where just too powerful for Moon to handle with so few talons. Great timing, smart play and immaculate micro won Grubby the second map.

The final map fell on Twisted Meadows where Grubby got off to a good start, first creeping a gnoll camp without being harassed then flanking Moon while he crept a gnoll camp forcing the Demon Hunter to town portal.

Things turned abruptly in Moon’s favour when Grubby pushed the night elf base with just a Blademaster to cancel an ancient of lore. Moon played the situation perfectly, getting the surround kill on the Blademaster and blowing RotterdaM’s mind with his quick thinking. Moon was able to creep his goblin merchant in peace as a result and things really started looking good for the night elf player.

Moon, confident he had the advantage, pressed on towards Grubby’s side of the map to apply a little pressure to the orc. Grubby, not to be outdone by his teammate, rattled the audience by scoring two hero kills in the space of thirty seconds with a hex and speed scroll combo.

From then on Grubby took control of the match. The perfect timing we had seen throughout the tournament really shone through on Twisted Meadows. Grubby eventually confined Moon to his base where he was able to overpower the Korean to take the match.



The turning point on Twisted Meadows really was the duel hero kill in the center of the map, which stemmed from Grubby’s early harass that forced Moon to burn a town portal.

Grubby may have emerged victorious, but it was a tooth and nail battle that went down to the wire; and both of these players have something to be proud of.

For first place Grubby goes home with $20,000 USD, while teammate Moon earned $7,000USD for his troubles. Dmitriy 'Happy' Kostin, who placed third, will be awarded $3,500USD.