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ESL ESEA Pro League Finals: talking points

Disclaimer: Keep in mind that these are merely predictions and should not be used as a guideline for betting on GosuGamers or on any other site. The statements here originate from statistics and previous matches and can thus not be held evidential for the win or loss of a team. The author as well as gosugamers.net hereby distance themselves from any responsibilities in regards to betting losses.

 

This year has been an exciting journey for CS:GO fans.
We saw Fnatic burst to the top, we saw them fall, and we saw them rise again. We experienced Cloud9’s amazing summer run, we were able to boost our concurrent viewership of the biggest major far beyond a million. Investments were made not only by the fans who brought up over 4 million dollars in support for their teams, but also from industry leaders, that acknowledged the enormous potential for growth of the professional CS:GO community.

All this happened less than 360 days ago, but more importantly – it is not done yet. ESL has prepared one big ending to this year. The ESEA Pro League Finals will be held in two days and will bring together the biggest teams of the scene. One last battle is yet to happen, and judging from the performances of these teams lately, this will evolve into a brawl of unknown dimensions.

How will the runners-up perform?
In contrast to the European lineup that more or less depicts the current top four (arguably Virtus.Pro could belong there as well), the NA competitors have brought a rather new face to the finals, which is Conquest. It was a total surprise to see them perform so well at the CEVO finals, and it was a rather short-lived success as well. Some days later they got pretty much shredded at the iBUYPOWER Cup and since then they have not been competing too much recently. Judging from their performance at CEVO, where they beat Liquid and Dignitas, there is definitely a probability for them to get into the spotlight again.
Luminosity is one of the key talking points in regards to breakthrough teams. Everybody had already written them off after their 16-0 loss to fnatic at DreamHack Winter. But they came back, as unexpected as it may have been, and stood up to Fnatic again, this time in the grand finals. Though not being able to get more than one map off the Swedes, Luminosity have demonstrated that they are able to eliminate just about everyone, since they went over Team EnVyUs, Ninjas in Pyjamas and even TSM to get to the finals. And this was not due to bad performances by the enemy teams. After their win against EnVyUs nobody will underestimate them. Instead people will see that they showed a beautiful arrangement of individual talent and great teamwork. No luck was involved there, it was just them showing their full potential and if they unleash that again, they could possibly stomp just about any other team at these finals.


In addition to that, they have got the easier group to come out of. Natus Vincere have proven to be inconsistent to some extent lately, while the ex-TSM lineup has had difficulties recently at Fragbite, where they got kicked out by SK Gaming, an opponent they should actually outmatch, even at SK’s highest performance.
Counter Logic Gaming is probably the lowest team in that constellation right now, definitely showing some potential, but no indication to derive a possible upset from. The fact that Na’Vi has not had an encounter with the updated Luminosity roster comes in handy as well, since there are many possibilities and sources to get gameplay material from the Ukrainians, but not much to be found from Luminosity, except for their short run at DH Winter.
All in all this group could be very different from what it would have gone just a month ago and considering that Luminosity have brought up enough reasons to establish them as a top team, then their win within the group and even in this tournament in general should not even be called an upset anymore. Just like Team EnVyUs have found their revenge on to fnatic within just one major, Luminosity may have improved just that tiny bit that they need to place themselves on the very top.
 


Should fnatic and EnVyUs have no reason to fear Group A?
With Fnatic and EnVyUs both blocking the entrance into the quarterfinals, it may get hard or nearly impossible for Liquid or Conquest to break through. If Conquest are to win this, they need an enormous amount of luck and incredible individual plays, because not even their CEVO performance, as mentioned above, should be enough to break the Fnatic that is now making their way back to the top. Liquid, though statistically having been far better than Conquest in recent time, could actually have an even harder time. Not because of EnVyUs being a harder enemy than Fnatic, but because of their play styles, which seem to collide considering that both teams have demonstrated their overall tendency to fast and aggressive terrorist plays. Liquid mostly gains their confidence from swiftly executed T-sides, which compensates for their problematic CT-sides. Most teams have issues getting control over this type of fast teams, such as Virtus.Pro, in whose category Liquid definitely belongs to.
Now bear in mind that EnVyUs is comprised of five players that all have at some point in their past or even now played the position of an entry-fragger/lurker. It is their specialty to react to a fast play style and to counter it with a fair amount of aggression themselves, which is why Liquid should have a rather hard time coming out on top. It is difficult to tell how EnVyUs will show up since their last appearances at the Starladder StarSeries have required a stand-in for Happy, thus these performances should not be evaluated as worthy examples. Fnatic are again the clear favorites for this group, having shown consistent top-performances lately. If EnVyUs are to play the same level they have shown before, e.g. at DreamHack Cluj-Napoca, then this winner’s match should evolve into an exciting rematch of the Cluj-Napoca quarter finals.

 

The ESL ESEA Pro League finals should see a comfortable and worthy exit of this year, as well as prove that there are amazing things to come for 2016. So tune in and say goodbye to 2015’s Counter-Strike: Global Offensive run!

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