SL i-League Invitational Shanghai Preview

The four-day event will kick off with GSL format groups to be played out integrally in best-of-threes, followed by semifinals, a third-place decider, and a grand final, after which the champions of the second invitational tournament by StarLadder and i-League will be crowned.

The tournament, which was supposed to feature Major winners Gambit and EU qualifier winners Space Soldiers, will finally have Virtus.pro and HAVU, EU qualifier runners-up, in their stead as visa issues and scheduling conflicts marred the aforementioned teams’ plans to attend. After those changes, here is what the group stage looks like:

Group A	Group B
Heroic	Virtus.pro
TYLOO	Renegades
HellRaisers	HAVU
Spirit	Flash

*All ratings from the past three months on LAN except HellRaisers whose ratings are online

Group A

Heroic #16	Age	Rating 2.0
Nikolaj "⁠niko⁠" Kristensen	19	0.99
Jakob "⁠JUGi⁠" Hansen	20	0.97
Andreas "⁠MODDII⁠" Fridh	28	0.94
Patrick "⁠es3tag⁠" Hansen	21	0.86
Marco "⁠Snappi⁠" Pfeiffer	27	0.86

Offline placings in the past three months

5-8th	ELEAGUE CS:GO Premier 2017
7-8th	ESG Tour Mykonos 2017

Heroic, one of the invited teams to Shanghai, are the top seed—ranked #16 in the world—and the favorites to take Group A. Other than being the highest ranked team by a fairly large margin (over 10 positions to the next team in Group A, HellRaisers at #27) they are the only team that consistently play offline against top competition. The Danes eliminated SK from the ELEAGUE Premier group stage and then went on to play the quarterfinals of the Atlanta based tournament where they lost to local rivals North. Before that, Heroic were present at ESG Tour Mykonos, although their showing there was less than stellar going out in last place with losses to Gambit and to the eventual champions of the Greek tournament, MOUZ.

Heroic have a clear shot at the final if its stars show up

The Danish team hasn’t been as active as during other periods and has only played those two LANs in the past three months. Before that, however, the Danes maintained a continuity through time larger than most of their Group A opposition, having been a staple at events such as DreamHack Opens and other tournaments both large and small alike. The RFRSH-owned team is also the one with the most stable lineup as they haven’t made any changes to the starting roster since Valdemar "⁠valde⁠" Bjørn Vangså’s benching and es3tag’s signing in June, whereas all the other Group A teams in Shanghai have had movement in their ranks.

On top of being the only top 20 team in the group, they have maintained a solid top 20 ranking since the beginning of the year with only a slight dip to #21 during valde’s departure. Having the most contact with top-flight teams in leagues like ESL Pro League and ECS as well as playing at events like ESG Mykonos and ELEAGUE Premier on LAN puts Heroic one step above all Group A opposition.

This will be the first event for Heroic without a coach since the departure of Henrik "⁠FeTiSh⁠" Christensen, but having Snappi calling the shots should give the team enough security on the server to top the group. Added to that is JUGi’s ability to single-handedly turn the tables with his AWP if in good form and a best-of-three opener in which Heroic will have the chance to play some of their more comfortable maps like Overpass or Mirage against Spirit.

HellRaisers #27	Age	Rating 2.0
Kirill "⁠ANGE1⁠" Karasiow	28	1.10
Issa "⁠ISSAA⁠" Murad	20	1.07
Bence "⁠DeadFox⁠" Böröcz	22	1.03
Kristjan "⁠fejtZ⁠" Allsaar	20	1.18
Patrik "⁠Zero⁠" Žúdel (substitute)	19	1.05

Offline placings in the past three months

N/A

HellRaisers is one of the teams that suffered the most after the PGL Major Main Qualifier as the team completely fell apart. After the PGL Major rumors had ANGE1 moving, although it was finally Martin "⁠STYKO⁠" Styk who went to MOUZ and Vladyslav "⁠bondik⁠" Nechyporchuk who also departed the team. Not long after that, Zero left the active roster disintegrating the core of the team. Since then HellRaisers has been rebuilding around IGL ANGE1 and AWPer DeadFox, first signing young Turkish prospect Özgür "⁠woxic⁠" Eker, world wanderer fejtZ—who was unable to find stability in North America or China and will now have a shot at settling with HellRaisers at home—, and ISSAA, the first Jordanian professional Counter-Strike player.

Zero will be brought back to the active lineup for Shanghai, however, as woxic was unable to secure a visa for the Chinese event, further murking predictions surrounding the team. Despite being ranked #27 in the world there is actually little to go off of as Zero and fejtZ haven’t actually played together, and a key figure in this new lineup, woxic, will be missing.

ANGE1's side is an enigma offline as this team hasn't been to a LAN yet

If we’re to go by recent results, however, HellRaisers is a mixed bag. They have been performing decently in ESL Pro League, where they have a fatigue advantage over teams that have been traveling a lot to play top flight offline events while they stay home—HellRaisers hasn’t attended a LAN since DreamHack Atlanta with their old roster in July.

Playing against worse teams but in a more competitive environment, HellRaisers has also struggled, as they only qualified to DreamHack Denver out of myriad qualifiers—including the one for this event, which they were ultimately invited to—and missed it because woxic was unable to secure a visa to North America.

Playing in HellRaisers’s favor will be the fact that despite going through major structural changes, their group is not particularly strong. With the exception of Heroic, TYLOO has given up its throne as best team in Asia after struggling with teams like Renegades and Flash, and Spirit is a squad that has also been quiet internationally for well over half a year when they went 0-3 at the Major Qualifier in Atlanta. With these rivals, HellRaisers can still hope to sneak through to the playoffs if the opener against TYLOO goes their way. With Cache, Cobble, and Inferno highly likely to be thrown in the mix, chances are the team that can get comfortable in the server first will take the opener.

TYLOO #39	Age	Rating 2.0
Hansel "⁠BnTeT⁠" Ferdinand	22	1.16
Vladyslav "⁠bondik⁠" Nechyporchuk	24	1.13
HaoWen "⁠somebody⁠" Xu	22	1.07
Hui "⁠DD⁠" Wu	23	0.96
Ke "⁠captainMo⁠" Liu	28	0.95

Offline placings in the past three months

2nd	Asia Minor - ELEAGUE Major 2018
3-th	EPICENTER 2017 Wild Card Qualifier
5-8th	WESG 2017 China Finals (3/5 of lineup)

Since YuLun "⁠Summer⁠" Cai, YuanZhang "⁠Attacker⁠" Sheng, and QiFang "⁠Karsa⁠" Su left TYLOO to create Flash, the Chinese giant has been losing momentum. Looking to expand outside national borders, TYLOO signed Luis "⁠peacemaker⁠" Tadeu as coach, BnTeT as their star player, and most recently bondik on loan from the team they will be playing the opening match against. More and more, TYLOO has lost the title of best team in Asia after losing two best-of-threes against Renegades in the Asia Minor and barely qualifying against Flash, winning in the last round of the decider map in the consolidation final.

Other than the Asia Minor and the EPICENTER 2017 Wild Card Qualifier which they expectedly lost 2-0 to FaZe, TYLOO hasn’t played at any other event other than the WESG 2017 China Finals where they played with Zhen "⁠HZ⁠" Huang and ZhenDong "⁠Not7⁠" Mo and finished in 5-8 place after losing to Flash. With such little activity it is hard to really see what TYLOO’s progression has been, and especially if the team’s communication has become any better—something many are skeptical about.

TYLOO’s fate could very much be intertwined with that of their opening match rivals, HellRaisers, as chances are they will end up facing each other once again in the Group A decider match unless Heroic somehow choke or Spirit surprise. If so, who gets out of the group may well come down to who can adjust quicker and more effectively in a rematch.

Spirit #43	Age	Rating 2.0
Vadim "⁠DavCost⁠" Vasilyev	21	1.16
Dmitry "⁠S0tF1k⁠" Forostyanko	23	1.16
Pavel "⁠COLDYY1⁠" Veklenko	25	1.15
Dmitriy "⁠Dimaoneshot⁠" Bandurka	22	1.08
Vladyslav "⁠arch⁠" Svistov	21	1.08

Offline placings in the past three months

3rd	CIS Minor - ELEAGUE Major 2018
1st	Binary Dragons Prestige LAN

Spirit made it to Shanghai after winning the CIS qualifier by beating AVANGAR in the final, a team they since lost to 2-0 on LAN in the CIS Minor. DavCost & co. don’t have much to go off of as their only two recent events were the CIS Minor where they came in third and the Binary Dragons Prestige LAN which they won. As far as online play goes, Spirit are in ESEA MDL Season 26, but aren’t looking too solid as they hold a subpar 2-6 record.

The core of this team has been together for a long time, but the replacement of Sergey "⁠starix⁠" Ischuk for arch doesn’t seem to have had a vast change in Spirit’s results. Going into the Shanghai event the Russian-Ukrainian team is the underdog in their group, especially opening up against the group favorite, Heroic. As several of the other teams in the group have been fairly inactive and have undergone structural changes, however, nothing is off the table as a lot of ends are open going into the Chinese event.

Group B

Virtus.pro #6	Age	Rating 2.0
Paweł "⁠byali⁠" Bieliński	23	1.04
Jarosław "⁠pashaBiceps⁠" Jarząbkowski	29	0.99
Filip "⁠NEO⁠" Kubski	30	0.95
Janusz "⁠Snax⁠" Pogorzelski	24	0.93
Wiktor "⁠TaZ⁠" Wojtas	31	0.88

Offline placings in the past three months 

2nd	EPICENTER 2017
13-16th	ELEAGUE CS:GO Premier 2017
7-8th	ESL One New York 2017
4th	ESG Tour Mykonos
13-16th	DreamHack Masters Malmö 2017

Last week the Polish players of Virtus.pro would have been the favorites as the #13 team in the world, although more by virtue of not having much opposition than because of being a particularly feared team. This week, however, everything changed after the Polish side put in an extremely solid showing at EPICENTER 2017 beating teams like Gambit, FaZe, and G2 on their way to one of the most exciting finals we’ve seen this year where they went down to SK in overtime of the fifth map, jumping to the #6 spot in the world in the process.

Now, anything other than completely smashing every other team attending the event in Shanghai will be seen as a defeat for the Poles, whose group is several tiers below the play NEO & co. showed they are capable of in Saint Petersburg after defeating two top 5 teams and a top 10 team. This being said, the ghosts of group stage exits at ELEAGUE Premier and ESL One New York could easily come back were Virtus.pro to flounder against such feeble opposition, making this an easy event but also one filled with pressure for just that reason.

Anything but a victory would be a disaster for the Poles after EPICENTER

In China, Virtus.pro will kick their run off against Flash, a team that wasn’t able to make it to the Main Qualifier of the upcoming ELEAGUE Major and that is well out of the top 20 at #40. Being as matches are best-of-three there is not much leverage for Summer and the rest of Flash as they and Virtus.pro share a similar map pool with Train, Mirage, Cache, and Inferno all being viable maps for their clash.

TaZ tweeted he hopes this will be the rebirth of Virtus.pro. As the veterans of the scene keep pushing the envelope it now remains to be seen if they can keep their momentum going and if they can try to consolidate themselves as a top contender again or if they will just have spurts of genius as they have had the past year, going dark for long periods of time and lighting up intermittently. This should be a good event for Virtus.pro to keep regaining confidence and closer to a permanent spot in the top 5, but could also go awry were the Poles to not secure a solid finish.

Renegades #18	Age	Rating 2.0
Keith "⁠NAF⁠" Markovic	19	1.23
Noah "⁠Nifty⁠" Francis	19	1.04
Aaron "⁠AZR⁠" Ward	25	1.02
Karlo "⁠USTILO⁠" Pivac	24	1.00
Justin "⁠jks⁠" Savage	21	0.97

Offline placings in the past three months

1st	Asia Minor - ELEAGUE Major 2018
3-4th	DreamHack Open Denver 2017
13-16th	ELEAGUE CS:GO Premier 2017
9-12th	DreamHack Masters Malmö 2017

The Australian-American team is on an upward trajectory having broken into the top 20 for the first time this year. While Nifty has been coming into his own little by little and proving himself a worthy prospect both with the big green and calling in-game as Aleksandar "⁠kassad⁠" Trifunović’s protege, Renegades hit the jackpot picking up ex-OpTic NAF to the fill the slot of fifth player that had been open since Nemanja "⁠nexa⁠" Isaković was let go.

Renegades has had a rough go in recent history at events that are a bit out of their reach, such as DreamHack Masters Malmö and ELEAGUE Premier, the former with David "⁠Jayzwalkingz⁠" Kempner and the latter with NAF, where they ended in 9-12th and 13-16th place respectively. At events a little bit more attuned to their level, Renegades shone, like at DreamHack Open Denver where they made the semifinals before falling to BIG or the Asia Minor in which they finished first giving up but one map—which they lost in overtime—out of nine.

With SL i-League Shanghai Invitational being more akin to a DreamHack Open than a DreamHack Masters, Renegades has a good chance at making it out of the group behind Virtus.pro as the American-Australian team has recently proved they can cleanly beat Flash 2-0 and shouldn’t have much trouble with the rather inexperienced HAVU. Renegades shouldn’t be happy with anything less than a semifinal finish, and should strive to give Heroic and Virtus.pro a run for their money.

HAVU #36	Age	Rating 2.0
Aleksi "⁠Aleksib⁠" Virolainen	20	1.38
Jere "⁠sergej⁠" Salo	15	1.32
Otto "⁠ottoNd⁠" Sihvo	19	1.25
Jesse "⁠KHRN⁠" Grandell	27	1.22
Mikko "⁠xartE⁠" Välimaa	25	1.16

Offline placings in the past three months

1st Finnish Esports League Season 3 Finals
1st Connection LAN 2017
1st ROG MASTERS 2017 Nordic Qualifier
1st Nordic Championship Season 1 Finals
1st ESPORTSM.fi 2017 Finals

HAVU ended up with a spot in the Shanghai Invitational somewhat by chance, as Space Soldiers had a scheduling conflict and would be unable to attend the Chinese event. As the next team in line thanks to being the runners up in the European qualifier HAVU got the spot. The Finns have become the biggest team in their home country as iGame.com has been slowly disintegrating, and this union of veterans xartE and KHRN with three of the most talented youngsters in finland, Aleksib, ottoNd, and particularly the "too-young-to-play" sergej, has started to pay dividends as they rack up trophies locally. Now, HAVU will have to step it up against foreign opposition.

This team, which has been around with this lineup since summer, is completely unproven. Not only together, but the youngsters in this team will be at their first big international LAN this week in Shanghai, which could be an unsettling factor for some. Luckily for the Finns, other than Virtus.pro if they play like they did at EPICENTER, none of the teams in the group are amongst the best in the world, and HAVU will have a shot at playing several maps against a couple different teams to get into the groove of things.

sergej, the 15-year-old Finnish prospect, will debut internationally in Shanghai

Offline, HAVU only have local and regional results, all of which they have won and none of which are particularly worth mentioning. Online, it’s a handful of deep runs in qualifiers, including the one for this event in which they ultimately lost to Ismailcan "⁠XANTARES⁠" Dörtkardeş & co. For the young HAVU players, this event will certainly be a milestone. However, don’t expect them to go to far.

HAVU will open against Renegades, a team that has been going onward and upward as stalwarts AZR and jks got a solid youngster in Nifty and a lethal all-arounder in NAF. That being said, it is not impossible that a team like HAVU could give Renegades a run for their money despite a lack of experience, although it is more likely that they end up playing Flash for a spot in the decider and a few more maps under their belts.

Flash #40	Age	Rating 2.0
YuanZhang "⁠Attacker⁠" Sheng	20	1.25
YuLun "⁠Summer⁠" Cai	20	1.24
Andrew "⁠Kaze⁠" Khong	23	1.23
KunHua "⁠LOVEYY⁠" Bai	28	1.05
QiFang "⁠Karsa⁠" Su	25	0.97

Offline placings in the past three months

3rd	Asia Minor - ELEAGUE Major 2018
1st	eXTREMESLAND Asia Finals 2017
3rd	eXTREMESLAND 2017 China Regional Finals
2nd	WESG 2017 China Finals (4/5 of team)
1st	CS:GO Super League 2017 - Summer Season Finals

Last but not least is the second Chinese team, Flash, where Summer and Attacker now ply their trade. Flash has been unable to dethrone TYLOO as the best in China, but Summer & co. also manage to beat them on occasion. They’re currently ranked #40, just one below their local rivals, and are at a fairly similar level to that of their domestic opponent.

Flash drew the short stick and will be kicking the tournament off against Virtus.pro, the heavy favorites to take the event after displaying fantastic Counter-Strike in Saint Petersburg last week. Flash’s options rather lie in beating HAVU and Renegades, although even the latter seem like a bit much to bite for the Chinese team as they lost to them 0-2 just two weeks ago at the Asia Minor.

On the positive side, this will be a good event to see what Flash has in store against international opposition, as most of their history is domestic, with a few matches against regional opposition scattered here and there. If Flash were able to make it to the decider, that should be considered a minor victory rather than a defeat.