Serral
Joona Sotala, better known by his gaming handle Serral, is a Finnish professional "Starcraft II" player using the race Zerg. In 2018, Serral became the first non-Korean player to win the StarCraft II World Championship Series (WCS). He won every major non-Korean tournament in 2018, the 2018 Global Starcraft II League (GSL) vs. the World event and, ultimately, the 2018 WCS Global Finals. In 2022, he won the Intel Extreme Masters Katowice, and with the updated championship format he won the world championship of StarCraft II for the second time. Section::::"Starcraft II" Career. Early career. Serral started  competing at Starcraft II in 2012, but did not initially make a big splash. His first major tournament win would come in 2017 with the World Championship Series (WCS) Jönköping European Qualifier win, beating Zanster, Mana, ShowTimE, Namshar and Elazer. He took 2nd place in the main event after beating Stephano, PtitDrogo and Elazer, but lost 3–4 to Neeb in the Finals. In 2017, he also won the European Qualifier for WCS Valencia, taking out Stephano, Bly, HeRoMaRinE and Elazer twice. During the main event, he was knocked out in the quarter finals by TRUE. Serral won the European Qualifier  for World Electronic Sports Games (WESG) by beating Clem, NightEnD, Starbuck, Majestic, uThermal, Elazer and Nerchio. In the main event, he did not lose a map during group play, beating ShoWTimE, Minato, Has, Elazer, Bly and Lambo. During playoffs he beat Neeb in the quarterfinals, but lost 0–3 to the eventual champion Maru. 2018. His first premier tournament win came in 2018 when he won WCS Leipzig, beating MaSa, Nerchio, SpeCial and ShoWTimE. He went on to win all 3 other major WCS tournaments in 2018, getting the first clean sweep, or Grand Slam, in WCS history. In WCS Austin , he defeated Kelazhur, HeRoMaRinE, Lambo and MaNa. In WCS Valencia, he beat Scarlett, Reynor, HeRoMaRinE and Has. In WCS Montreal, his domination of the 2018 WCS circuit was underscored by beating JonSnow, Scarlett, Lambo and Reynor. Serral also showed his prowess in the Korean scene at the 2018 Global Starcraft II League (GSL) vs. the World tournament where he took home a $26,901 prize over several of the strongest Korean players, beating Kelazhur, INnoVation, Dark and Stats. The year end WCS Global Finals at Blizzcon featured 2018's eight best non-Koreans and eight best Koreans, including Cho "Maru