Alliance group hug deny: Limmp at TI10

Alliance vs. T1 in the TI10 lower bracket

On October 14, 2021, day three of The International 10's main event, Alliance played T1 in the lower bracket. According to GosuGamers, it was lower bracket round two, and the loser was going home. Alliance had won The International back in 2013.

T1 won 2–0 and moved on in the TI10 lower bracket, while Alliance finished the tournament 9th–12th. After TI10, the organization parted ways with two players, Limmp and fng. Evil Geniuses were eliminated the same day: GosuGamers headlined the early exit of two former TI champions at once.

The group hug Limmp didn’t join

Before the series, the Alliance players tried to have a group hug in their booth. Linus “Limmp” Blomdin did not take part, and the broadcast showed the others gathering together without him.

Retellings sometimes claim that Limmp pushed his teammates away, but the sources do not back that up: what they describe is him not joining the hug. That same day, a 19-second clip titled “Limmp denied group hug with Alliance in TI10 vs T1” appeared on the YouTube channel King Hans Live, with the description “decides to not join the group huddle.” Short clips from the broadcast are what spread the moment through the community.

Alliance lost the series they had huddled up for 0–2 and were eliminated from the tournament.

A nod at the All-Star match and the year’s top memes

The episode quickly got a sequel. On October 16, 2021, at the TI10 All-Star match, where English-language casters played against Russian-language ones, the English team, Team Dragon, referenced “LIMMP not hugging the rest of Alliance” before the game. According to esports.gg's report, the Russian-speaking talent won the show match itself.

Sources differ on the details: the match report only mentions the reference, while the esports.gg meme roundup says the English team “reenacted” the hug. The same roundup ranked the episode eighth among the top Dota 2 memes of 2021.

A frame from the Alliance booth

The catalog card shows a frame from the TI10 broadcast. Alliance players stand by their chairs in their booth, leaning toward each other, with purple lighting in the background.

The frame shows the players huddling up before the series. That scene, a pre-match team ritual not everyone joined, is what the meme is built on.

Example captions and what the meme means

The meme is used when someone noticeably stays on the sidelines of a group effort: it is a joke about an awkward or aloof member and team spirit minus one person. These examples are made up for illustration: “The whole department posing for a photo at the office party while I'm at the buffet,” “The whole group agreed to submit the project together, but one person already turned in his own,” “The family New Year's photo and the cat who refused to be in it,” “The team high-fiving after the win while the goalie has already left for the locker room.”

A related meme is the TI10 All-Star match, where the story got its sequel and the English-language casters brought the episode up. The hug itself came on Alliance's last day at the tournament: the team went out that same day, and the roster changed after TI10.