Save- “This is the only reason I play Dota, to be able to compete in the main stage of TI”

BetBoom Team support Vitaly 'Save-' Melnik, in an interview at The International 2026, commented on today's victory over Aurora Gaming, assessed the group stage, and also shared his emotions after reaching the playoffs.

[Yesterday you lost to this team. How were these two series different? ] We decided to change some heroes and not give Earth Spirit to our opponents. I think we just had better drafts today.

At the 15th minute we weren't very confident. We swam a little and started constantly dying on the boat. But eventually Io reached its timings and became too strong - after that we could do whatever we wanted.

[ At what exact moment did you realize that the game was now back under your control? ] When Io bought Black King Bar, I felt confident that we could win. They didn't have very good heroes against our draft. When you see your carry with 20,000 net worth, you know you're going to win the map.

We weren't surprised by this. We understood that we would play against Aurora Gaming. We saw that they picked us in the elimination round and we were happy about that.

Even though we lost to them 0-4 in scrimmages and 0-2 yesterday, the knockout series is a completely different story.

I think we had some pretty good matches. We showed good Dota against the best teams in the world. We just couldn’t beat them, which is why we had to play a knockout match with Aurora Gaming.

This is the only reason I play Dota - to be able to compete in the main stage of TI. I'm very happy about this.

Earlier, Vitaly 'Save-' Melnik and Ilya 'Kiritych' Ulyanov spoke about the victory over Aurora Gaming in the elimination round at The International 2026.