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Deck Overview- Modern Watanabe Control

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The Magic World Championship this weekend didn't exhibit a lot of diversity in Modern. Most of the players were working with small teams of players in the event, and as such we saw a good chunk of Affinity, Bogles, and Living End. Yuuya Watanabe was the lone player on Azorius Control, and his list solid:

Modern UW Control

creatures

2 Dragonlord Ojutai
4 Kitchen Finks
3 Restoration Angel
1 Sun Titan
2 Vendilion Clique
4 Wall of Omens

spells

3 Supreme Verdict
3 Cryptic Command
4 Path to Exile
2 Remand
4 Spell Snare
2 Detention Sphere

lands

4 Celestial Colonnade
1 Eiganjo Castle
4 Flooded Strand
4 Ghost Quarter
2 Hallowed Fountain
3 Island
1 Minamo, School at Water's Edge
3 Plains
4 Mystic Gate

sideboard

2 Aven Mindcensor
1 Glen Elendra Archmage
1 Spellskite
1 Celestial Purge
1 Crucible of Worlds
1 Dispel
1 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Negate
2 Stony Silence
3 Threads of Disloyalty

This deck is really capitalizing on Spell Snares position in the metagame, both by maxing out on its own copies and by minimizing the power of opposing Snares. Curiously, Yuuya even eschewed Snapcaster Mage, which is commonly considered the most powerful card in Modern.

The combination of Restoration Angel and Kitchen Finks is nothing new, but it's something that we haven't seen in a while. These creatures combine to both make a very powerful clock and a difficult wall of life and blockers to break through. Not to mention that both creatures present bodies that can't just be Lightning Bolted.

There was an error retrieving a chart for Restoration Angel

A couple players have tried Dragonlord Ojutai in Modern. It looks a little cute to me, but it's certainly powerful in long games and is another card you can blink with Restoration Angel. You can also untap Ojutai with Minamo, School at Water's Edge to give it hexproof while attacking. Perhaps more importantly the Minamo pairs well with the Mystic Gates to help you beat Choke. You get a little weak to Blood Moon with this manabase, but there are enough basics and you can even Path to Exile your own dudes to get around this, which we saw Yuuya do against Shaun McLaren.

This is yet another deck that leans heavily on Ghost Quarter to beat Tron, which is a pretty low-cost inclusion. The damage to the manabase is also mitigated largely by Mystic Gate, though these two lands do open up the possibility that you have three or more land hands that can't cast any colored spells.

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