Aussie Teen Anathan ‘ana’ Pham Claims Part Of $50m Prize Pool After Winning Esport Tournament

Australian esports player, Anathan ‘ana’ Pham, has taken home a share of the $AU50 million prize pool on offer at ‘The International’, after helping his team win the Dota 2 tournament in Shanghai.

The International, which is in its second year of competition, boasted the biggest esports prize in history for which the 19-year old’s team, OG, has claimed the largest slice of.

OG has become the first side to win two Dota 2 world championships and combined with this year’s victory, the five-man team has now won over $AU38 million across two tournaments, of which Pham likely took home between 15 and 20 per cent.

Now Pham and Topias ‘Topson’ Taavitsainen, along with France’s Sebastian ‘Ceb’ Debs, Finland’s Jesse ‘JerAx’ Vainikka and Denmark’s Johan ‘n0tail’ Sundstein are the five highest-earning esports players of all time.

For the second straight year, OG went safely through the upper bracket of the tournament, defeating 2018 runners-up and home country favourites PSG.LGD in the upper bracket finals before vanquishing 2017 champions Team Liquid in the five-game Grand Final.

After losing the first game of the series, OG rebounded in dominant fashion, then sealing the championship in game four with Pham playing his now-trademark core Io.

Despite the Australian Dota 2 community remaining small, it has now produced a Grand Finalist at The International for three straight years, including Sydney’s Damien ‘kpii’ Chok who was a runner-up in 2017.