The teams participating in stage two are: Tricked Esports, Se7en eSports, Virtus.pro, ESPADA, Heroic, BIG, M1X and AVANGAR.
This CS:GO betting preview will focus on the opening two fixtures for the ECS S8 Series 2 schedule, which will be played on Monday, September 30 at 17:00 CEST.
Tricked Esports vs Se7en eSports
Tricked Esports – $1.23
This will be the first fixture of ECS S8 for Tricked Esports, who did not participate in series one of the tournament.
That being said, they are not coming into this stage cold, but rather piping hot, following their incredible display at V4 Future Sports Festival – Budapest 2019, where the Danes went against all the odds and won the title.
Claiming the title and €150,000 in prize money against a tough line-up in Hungary was not only a huge accomplishment for Tricked, but also a massive morale boost, which could push them to produce something in ECS S8 as well.
Se7en eSports – $3.62
The Kazakhstan outfit are entering this fixture as underdogs, and we can’t argue with that logic.
Se7en eSports, while a solid team can hardly compare to Tricked, especially considering Tricked seem to be on a roll, following their title winning run in Hungary, which concluded barely a week before this fixture will take place.
Prediction: Tricked -1.5 at $1.83 with GG Bet
On any other day, we would trust Se7en eSports to at least win one map against Tricked, but seeing how strong the Danish outfit looked in Budapest, we are confident saying Tricked are not going to have a hard time wining this one.
If they can keep up the form they have shown in Hungary, they should defeat Se7en eSports in two swift rounds, and we will trust them to do just that.
Virtus.pro vs ESPADA
Virtus.pro – $1.23
The Polish outfit are favourites against ESPADA and for all the right reasons.
They proved their worth at V4 Future Sports Festival, where Virtus.pro climbed their way to the finals, only to suffer a painful defeat against Tricked Esports (1-2).
Despite the fact Virtus.pro lost their shot at the title and €150,000, we have to acknowledge they crushed both NiP (2-0) in quarter-finals and mousesports (2-0) in the semis, the latter of which is currently ranked seventh strongest team in the world.
ESPADA – $3.62
It’s hard to imagine ESPADA winning anything here, considering they can hardly measure up to VIrtus.pro in terms of firepower, experience and overall quality.
While there is no denying Virtus.pro are far from what they used to be, they are still among the top 20 teams in the world. ESPADA, on the other side, are barely in the top 60.
Odds reflect perfectly what ESPADA’s chance is to win here, and we can’t argue with it.
Prediction: Virtus.pro -1.5 at $1.83 with GG Bet
While there is no doubt Virtus.pro should win this fixture with relative ease, there is always the element of surprise with the Polish side.
While they can play extremely good, Virtus.pro is also all too familiar with “choking” at unfortunate moments, leading us to believe their fixtures can easily go either way.
That being said, Virtus.pro, even on their worst day should be more than capable of defeating ESPADA, which is why we will side with the Polish outfit to win this one with ease.
Both teams performed well on the road to the finals. Vitality earned their spot with a superb performance in ECS Season 7 – Europe, where they joined Ninjas in Pyjamas, North and Astralis as one of four teams to progress. FURIA had to go through the ECS S7 – North America tournament, where advanced alongside joining MIBR, NRG and compLexity.
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FURIA, who were put in Group A with NRG, Astralis and NiP, managed to finish second with a 2-1 record, which they earned with a 2-1 win over Astralis in the decider match on June 7. The most impressive part here is that FURIA defeated the former no.1 team in the world Astralis in a convincing fashion, 16-10 on Mirage and 16-13 on Nuke.
Vitality also claimed second spot, but in Group B, where they sealed the deal with a 9-16 win over compLexity and then defeated the same opponent 2-0 in the decider match.
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The playoffs saw Vitality paired with NRG, while it was North who stood in the way of FURIA in the semi-finals. Against all odds, both NRG and North went down in clean sweeps to set up a grudge match between two teams that met at the recent DreamHack Masters Dallas event. FURIA won on that occasion, but Dan “apEX” Madesclaire made it clear in the lead-up to the ECS S7 Finals that Vitality were out for revenge.
Vitality entered Inferno hungry for a win and dominated FURIA in every possible department, even managing to shut down the aggressive playstyle that has been the bane of many teams. Only one point separated the two teams at half-time, but the French side blasted away after the break to claim a 16-9 win.
Vitality entered the second map (Overpass) with all guns blazing and finished the first half with a 12-3 lead. They needed to win only four more rounds after the interval and got them with relative ease, thus winning the map and the series.
A lot of credit for Vitality’s dominance must go to Mathieu “ZywOo” Herbaut, who walked away from the ECS Finals with a 1.81 HLTV rating, but it was a team effort that got them the title.
Astralis have suffered from a serious lack of matches after avoiding several tournaments this year, but they had a chance to show their quality against the no.11 team in the HLTV rankings.
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The Bo1 match took place on Nuke. FURIA started off the game the best possible way, soon finding themselves in a respectable 3-0 lead. The first rifle round of the map was a close one, but it was Peter “dupreeh” Rasmussen who proved his worth and clutched the 1v2 to get his team a point and seemingly enough motivation for Astralis to start snowballing.
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Winning the rifle round gave the Danes enough advantage to overtake FURIA and edge out to a 5-3 lead. After that Astralis slowed down, or maybe it was FURIA who managed to step up, as the teams started to trade maps back and forth. That continued until Andrei “arT” Piovezan picked up a triple kill on B Bombsite, which allowed FURIA to take an 8-7 lead into the half-time break.
The momentum shifted again in the second half when Astralis again caught up and took the lead after winning the pistol round and surviving anti-ecos. The Danish side pressed the advantage and looked assured of victory when they stretched the scoreline to 14-9.
Only two rounds from defeat, FURIA rallied through Kaike “KSCERATO” Cerato and managed to equalise the match of 14-14. It did not stop there, as KSCERATO found another gear again in the final stretch by clutching a crucial 1v2 to snatch the 16th point and leave Astralis speechless.
That incredible comeback win puts FURIA top of Group A, from which the top two teams will advance to the ECS Season 7 semi-finals on June 8.
The opening round of the Esports Championship Series Season 7 continues on Thursday afternoon with a BO1 clash between Ninjas in Pyjamas and NRG.
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Ninjas in Pyjamas’ most recent tournament was the DreamHack Masters Dallas 2019, where they performed quite terribly. They barely managed to win over TyLoo (16-13) and lost two series to FaZe Clan and Vitality without even taking one map. They showed some resilience in the last map against Vitality but still lost 16-14 in the end. NiP failed to win more than eight rounds on any of their other maps.
NRG were also present at the DreamHack Masters. They started their campaign with a loss to the Brazilian team FURIA, who completely outclassed them in a 16-7 BO1 match. They won 2-1 in their second match against Cloud9 but were eventually eliminated by the home favourites, G2.
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These two teams have played a total of four BO1 matches between them. The last time they met was at IEM Katowice 2019, where Ninjas in Pyjamas just managed to win 16-14 on Nuke. Fredrik “REZ” Sterner was the difference in that win, racking up 33 kills, 92.2 ADR and a massive 1.53 HLTV rating across 30 rounds. Patrik “f0rest” Lindberg was not far behind with 31 kills and a 1.52 HLTV rating. While it is a rare sight to see both of these players stepping up at the same time, NiP invariably fail to perform when neither of them do.
NRG’s best player that day was their IGL, Damian “daps” Steele, who finished the match with a 1.21 HLTV rating. It is quite unusual to see an IGL on top of the leaderboard and it usually means the rest of the team played very poorly. Their star player, Tsvetelin “CeRq” Dimitrov, finished the match with only 12 kills, which is one of the main reasons NRG lost that day.
NiP vs FURIA ECS7 betting predictions
Neither of these two teams are in great form, but NRG should prevail here. They are priced around $1.80, which makes them a slight favourite over NiP. Although the recent results of both teams are quite similar, NRG have the better players and the recent addition of Tarik “tarik” Celik only adds more depth to the roster. All in all, this should be a close one with NRG finishing on top.
Prediction: NRG to win – Best odds at GG Bet
]]>Astralis and FURIA will do battle this Thursday in the opening match of the Esports Championship Series Season 7.
Astralis have not been especially active in the past three months as they have only attended the BLAST Pro Series events, with their only win coming in S?o Paulo. Their absence from the more prestigious tournaments has earned them the nickname ‘Blastralis’ and as a bonus Team Liquid managed to surpass them in the HLTV rankings as the number one team in CS:GO esports, which surely won’t do wonders for morale at Astralis.
Team members have said they are not attending more events due to overwork and illness, but the truth is that they have a contract with the BLAST organisers which forces them into attending these sub-standard tournaments.
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The last event Astralis played at was the BLAST event in Madrid. They played a total of five BO1 matches, winning against Ninjas in Pyjamas, Giants, Natus Vincere and Cloud9 while losing only to ENCE. Four wins were enough for them to qualify for the grand finals, where they once again faced ENCE, but this time in BO3 type of match. ENCE shocked the world, winning 16-9 on Nuke and 16-13 on Train to take the trophy in straight sets.
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FURIA, meanwhile, have enjoyed plenty of success in the last three months. They reached the finals on their home soil at the DreamHack Open Rio 2019, but the pressure got to them and they lost 2-1 to AVANGAR. They were quite successful at the recent DreamHack Masters Dallas 2019 as well, beating teams like NRG, Fnatic and Vitality while losing to the eventual finalists ENCE and Team Liquid. They also took a map off ENCE, which is an achievement in itself. In the end, they took fourth place overall and $22,000 prize money.
Astralis vs FURIA ECS7 betting predictions
FURIA come into this match in great form and in good spirits, so they should fancy their chances against a team that may be quite rusty.
The odds on FURIA are around $4.00, which is way over par. This is the first encounter between these two teams and a BO1 format is perfect for a first-round upset.
FURIA are clearly in better form and they have enough LAN experience to beat a team that has been out of the game for some time.
Prediction: FURIA to win – Best odds at GG Bet
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