Photos taken from: teamliquid.net, aftonbladet.se
*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.
The first ever major on NA soil promises to provide us with first class CS:GO action and the offline qualifier, running from Feb. 26-28 indeed seems to be able to bring just as much action. Additionally, we will finally be allowed to see all the new rosters on the big stage, how the shuffle has panned out and how far the underdogs are capable of pushing. A total of ten teams in the qualifier tournament have had roster changes, two having only been formed very recently.
There is a huge amount of new faces in the qualifier line-up, rather they are new to people who have exclusively been following the tier one pro scene. From the MongolZ to Enemy and Gambit to Tempo Storm, there is fresh blood in the system, ready to upset the more established teams.
Will the recent NA shuffle push the North American teams forward or will it hold them back?
Many would argue that the time to integrate the new players might not have been sufficient and that in general, the teams have not had ample opportunities to compete in official matches. Indeed, in contrast to Europe, the event density in NA was close to zero, but Cloud9 and CLG have had the opportunity to bring their recent recruits to European soil at the GEC finals. Even a slight glimpse of competition against EU teams will surely have had a positive effect on them.
Indeed, the two NA teams have proven to start this year stronger than before. Cloud9 has definitely improved, but it is necessary to mention that they have come out of a very big slump and there is much work to be done still. Stewie2k has done his job quite well and on his first major LAN event he has managed to stay calm and focused and has appeared on the leaderboard in a more or less consistent fashion. Most of the matches he did not manage to succeed in getting a positive KDA, but his teammates (aside from Skadoodle or maybe Shroud) did not either. In general, Cloud9 struggled at the tournament, but, reassuringly, not quite as much as they have before. They seem to have issues regarding double-peeking, getting re-frags and planning out executions. They are sometimes going for a more puggy, loose style of play. much like Team EnVyUs, which simply is not working out on their T sides. Their CT sides actually pan out perfectly for them. They lost their first map to EnVyUs, despite having had a 12:3 CT half on de_Mirage. Their terrorist executions fell through so heavily, that they only managed to acquire a single round throughout the entire half. If they work on honing their T-sides in the time that is left until the qualifier, which they surely will, we might see a strong, dominant Cloud9 again.
The integration of Fugly has worked out very well. CLG's attendance at the GEC finals has brought them wins over FlipSid3, as well as two seperate map wins against EnVyUs. Their biggest success was taking out the hot G2 eSports, who managed to eliminate NiP in order to reach the offline finals. The French were expected to make it way further than just the quarter finals. Despite their crushing loss against Astralis, CLG have achieved much and being placed top four in an international event is definitely something to be proud of.
One of the two teams attending that could potentially have been hurt by the shuffle is Team Liquid. Of course they have gained one of the most ambitious upcoming CIS stars, but he has just recently arrived. s1mple, their newest acquisition, is not fluent in English and it is natural to assume that his integration into the team will take a while. Fortunately for Liquid the addition will most likely solve their AWPing problem. Recently adreN had taken over the sniper role and has shown that he is not proficient with the weapon, to say the least. In addition the aforementioned his in-game calling suffered, as he was just simply overloaded with tasks.
The Americas Minor Championship victors, Enemy, are experiencing a similar situation. They have made it to the Qualifier surpassing a plethora of decent NA teams, and that is in great part due to the performance of Kenneth "koosta" Suen. Their AWPer has been described as one of the key upcoming talents in the region and it won't be long till a top North American team picks him up. Liquid have allegedly signed koosta, but in doing so have probably not contributed positively to the situation of NA, at least not for this particular event. adreN, who was previously mentioned as the unstable and inconsistent factor on the team, will now have to deal with the feeling of rejection as well, as he is the one to be removed in order to make space for koosta. Ironically, this event will go down with koosta remaining in his position, as he is not allowed to play on a different team other than the one he had qualified with. In case adreN remains on the starting roster for this event, knowing that he will be cut out later, he might actually experience a confidence boost or maybe an absolute confidence shutdown altogether.
Keep an eye on both teams, because as things change they can always work out for the better, but nonetheless these moves will certainly not have helped them in terms of being set up and prepared for the event.
Is Tempo Storm the new Luminosity?
Not that we would need one, but ever since DreamHack Winter last year, LG have kept themselves on the very top of the CS:GO chain. They did not come out of nowhere, since they have attended all majors of that year with mediocre success, reaching the playoffs at least, though bailing out in the quarter-finals. Suddenly, with the addition of TACO and fnx they were able to beat all the teams they previously lost to. It is a very steep ladder from being a top-20 team at the best of times, to being a consistent top-five contender. All of this is due to the heart, the motivation, and the incredible amount of work and effort that has gone into the team.
Once again, a Brazilian team has claimed a spot that should belong to a North American team. Both the MLG Last Chance tournament and the IEM: Katowice 2016 NA qualifier have given the first place to Tempo Storm, former Games Academy. Just shortly after their huge success at the MLG Last Chance, they have been picked up by an organisation that is based in the U.S, much like Luminosity was. Subsequently, they sweeped away Liquid, CLG and Cloud9. Given Tempo Storm show this kind of dominance at the upcoming event, the associated fear factor will extend further than simply NA representatives. Their rise could be just as high as LG's, and perhaps considerably faster. This might be the event we see the underdog breaking out, whilst their opponents would cave in and crumble under them. They have the element of surprise, as will be explained later, alongside a strong setup and skilfull individuals.
The advantage of the underdogs
Teams such as Gambit or The MongolZ have a huge advantage going into the event, due to the fact that they are new, low-tier and unpredictable. In preparation for a team, game demos are usually used to analyse the opponent's strategies in order to counter them, i.e. create anti-strats. There are almost no demos of matches available from the above mentioned teams, whereas demos for EnVyUs or Cloud9 are easy to find on the internet.
This means that, first of all, more established teams will have a hard time in preparation and secondly, the lesser known underdogs will be able to boast their existing strategies without having to fear predictability. The mental aspect will play a huge role as well, because even if more experienced teams were in posession of demos, they would not put much effort into preparation, because they would feel superior to them.
G2 should be able to sweep these teams away with ease, and this is where this mindset will come into play for these lesser known teams. We have seen enourmous amounts of raw fragging power that the Mongolian individuals can put up, and if they were to show up with some surprising tactics, they would be able to create minor upsets within the tournament.
As there are many high tier teams involved in this qualifier, a major upset is quite unlikely. Some suprises can be appropriated in order to counter the experience of one team, but it is nearly impossible to use that strategy for every map, or even the ones the team would not veto. If MongolZ or Gambit were to advance further, this would mean walking past Cloud9, CLG, dignitas, mousesports, G2 and others. The only way that this could potentially work would be if a number of underdogs managed to upset their opponents simultaneously, but again, this is very unlikely to happen.
Which contenders are old, which are new?
There are many teams to look out for in this qualifier and, in fact, there are only few teams that have only but a slight chance at coming through. There are eight spots available, and two teams from each group will advance. This of course means that weaker teams will only have to fight a specific collection of three teams and might get lucky by being placed with lesser skilled opponents. Contrary, this could mean that potentially stronger teams could be eliminated by being placed in a group with more skilled teams.
This system favours the average teams, rather than the ''crème de la crème'' of the scene. There are only two prime contenders that should definitely be able to walk out with fair ease or even unscarred. G2 eSports have shown a strong performance as of late and Team Dignitas have had an amazing run at DreamHack Leipzig. These two teams have shot up into the higher ranks, but musnt't feel safe in this position. If they refrain from underestimating their opponents, it is be feasible for them to advance further.
Since there are only two clear favorites, six spots remain vacant and an entirely different list of teams is now eligible to set themselves on top of their groups.
On one hand, there are the older, more established teams, such as mousesports, Vexed, CLG, Cloud9, HellRaisers and FlipSid3. The previously mentioned teams have shown inconsistent performances as of recent, rendering them unpredictable. Their chances are no longer set, meaning anything can happen.
On the other hand, there are so many new teams, whose team compositions have never seen the light of a major tournament before. SK Gaming are looking strong right now, their recent double-takedown of Na'Vi in the ESL Pro League just serves as a fitting example. The MongolZ have been on fire in Taipei, knocking Renegades out of the race. Although they probably deserve a spot in the aforementioned list, Liquid have experienced such a strong blow on their playstyle, as they have let their in-game leader go and now they might as well belong to this list, as they are not tested yet, but have added huge individual skill to their roster. Tempo Storm, the team that will perhaps entertain us the most, are a roster of invididuals that can potentially wreak havoc even on enemies such as mousesports or, as we have witnessed prior, their NA counterparts. Team YP present an unproven roster, that has already taken down Lounge Gaming and Team Ancient, two teams which would probably belong in this paragraph if they had been able to qualify, so it might be wise to view them as actual contenders for the title.
What is left is the real portion of underdogs, teams who walk below the bar of average in this list. Habituated here are Renegades, who have not shown significant results as of recent. It is doubtful as to whether the addition of USTILO will do much in order to change that. Enemy have sadly made their way down here as well, due to the loss of their strongest link, koosta. Gambit are a relatively unproven team and on their way through the CIS Minor they did not have to fight a strong bunch of enemies. Can they really get past the other 13 teams? Tt is very unlikely for them to advance any further.
Who are the players you should look out for?
Interest in the newest acquisitions should serve as an excuse to shift the focus onto them, but there are interesting individuals besides them as well.
For Cloud9, Stewie2k is the player the ingame camera should follow most, not because he has shown his prodigy talent yet, but because it will be his second LAN apperance and the enemies here are actually considerably weaker than what they had to fight against in the GEC finals. There is no EnVyUs here and we might finally see Cloud9 working out well against these teams, with Stewie2k doing work.
Liquid brings s1mple into the game. The CIS star has not had an important appearance for a long time now and he is ready to once again prove his enormous skill set.
koosta has for long now been the standout player for Enemy, and he will probably once more carry his team, be it towards success or loss, either way he will show up strong and consistent.
The MongolZ have a strong setup of fragging power and topping that, Machinegun, who will probably lead the score boards once again. Be ready to watch him get kills en masse.
SK Gaming may have to attribute a greater part of its recent success to Magiskboy, a young talent who usually dominates the score boards with an amazing amount of kills. He is fast and lethal and it is just refreshing to see young talent go so big in times of established and strong veterans leading the global rankings.
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