With IEM Cologne just a few weeks away, ESL pushed the SC2 qualification process into first gear last night. Three slots were available during the midweek Go4SC2 cup and it was Dmitriy 'Dimaga' Filipchuk who came out on top of the pile. He defeated Pierre 'SarenS' Guivarch in the final, with taking the vital 3rd place.

The final began on Steppes of War (SOW) with a macro-heavy TvZ. Sarens' reaper harassment on the zerg expansion proved fairly futile in the early game and so both players settled down for the long haul. Both players macroed and teched up, with Dimaga picking up a 3rd and 4th base and fully upgrading his ultralisks. In the end it came down to one push from the massive zerg army after an attempted nuke failed miserably, allowing the ultralisks to crush Sarens' tank/bio force.

Kulas Ravine proved to be a more action-packed game with Dimaga going for an early one base roach/zergling push. He attacked early via the destructible rock back door but the terran player just barely managed to hold it back with a couple of fortuitously timed banshees. Never the less, he took a massive economy hit which ultimately crippled him. By the time Sarens was strong enough to push back, Dimaga had expanded and teched to mutalisks. Upon seeing the first muta's, Sarens simply called "GG" on the spot.

The 3rd map was another brief encounter with equally intense action. Close spawns on Lost Temple lead to another expand/reaper game. But rather than one or two reapers for harassment, Sarens kept pumping them. He picked off a lot of units, but with no expansion of his own a few zerglings and drones weren't going to help him out. Eventualy he went for an all-in attack with a mix of reapers, hellions and marauders. But despite breaking through the spine crawler wall it took long enough for Dimaga to get mutalisks again. The Frenchman had no answer and Dimaga had a 3-0 win.

With three players now qualified the next Go4SC2 cup, on Sunday, is vitally important. It will be the last place to qualify for the event, outside of an invite. Ten players will be invited to Cologne to compete against the six from these cups in the first truly international LAN event for SC2.