FACEIT Major quarter-finals preview - part 1

19-9-2018 23:30

With the playoffs of the FACEIT London Major ahead of us, we took a look at Thursday's matchups, analyzing each team's chances to advance in the bracket.

The quarter-finals are split into two days, with two BO3s taking place per day. Starting off the action will be BIG and Natus Vincere, setting up a rematch of the ESL One Cologne grand final, with Complexity and MIBR taking the stage after them.

The duel of two veteran in-game leaders, Zeus and gob b, and two rosters based in North America, Complexity and MIBR, provide a lot of talking points and interesting storylines, so we will, for now, focus on the first two quarter-finals. The preview for Friday's matches will be released separately, on Thursday.

Ratings used are from the FACEIT Major New Legends Stage
Thursday, 16:15
BIG	Rating		Natus Vincere	Rating
smooya	1.54		electroNic	1.44
tabseN	1.27		s1mple	1.42
nex	1.21	vs.	flamie	1.28
gob b	1.10		Zeus	1.01
tiziaN	0.95		Edward	0.81
LEGIJA (coach)			Kane (coach)
EGB odds: 6.68			EGB odds: 4.44

BIG facing off against Natus Vincere is a tasty prospect for Counter-Strike fans, as the two teams have a vastly different set of strengths and weaknesses. The Ukrainian-Russian squad relies on s1mple and electroNic, a one-two punch combo that has this year looked as the deadliest duo out there. flamie has been able to contribute well, despite taking a step back to free up electroNic around DreamHack Masters Marseille. Spicing things up are Zeus' risky calls, such as relentless force buys as T and gamble stacking as CT, both helping them win some otherwise unwinnable rounds.

A stark contrast is BIG, who rely on doing the fundamentals as well as they can be done, playing the "gob b brand Counter-Strike". Utility is key; every flash, smoke, HE and molotov must be used with a specific purpose and in an optimal manner. That reflects in their Flash Assists, which BIG secure twice as often as Natus Vincere do: 0.34 to 0.16, looking at LAN stats in 2018. However, it is not like BIG don't have strong individual players: the form of smooya, who is the best rated of the tournament so far (excluding the New Challengers Stage) at 1.54, as well as of tabseN and nex, makes BIG a team who can hold their own against Natus Vincere.

BIG should get Dust2 in the veto, but Na`Vi won't be too troubled about it

Map pool wise, we certainly won't see Cache or Mirage, the two teams' permabans, being played, with BIG most certainly picking Dust2. The map has been a staple for gob b and historically a good one for German teams, while Natus Vincere have lost on it all six times they have played it with this roster. On paper, it seems like a free map win for BIG, but don't be quick to dismiss Natus Vincere—almost all of their losses have been fairly close and it feels like they could turn it around on the map soon. Going for Overpass seems like the obvious pick for Zeus, but BIG's 36% win rate on Inferno could make that the better option in the end. So even though they have a weak Dust2, Natus Vincere look good to take the win on any of the remaining maps that come up in the veto.

The last time these two teams met, in Cologne, BIG contested Natus Vincere throughout the BO5, until the action moved to Inferno, where nex fell off and finished the map with a 4-20 score. This time around, BIG have more confidence in their play and gob b has had a lot of time to prepare for this opponent, but Natus Vincere still have a style of play that will prove hard for them to counter. s1mple and co. were title contenders going into the event, and in their games so far (14-16 Astralis, 16-12 FaZe, 16-6 NiP, 16-9 fnatic), we haven't seen anything to disprove it. The quarter-final game against BIG surely won't be an easy one, but Na`Vi should have all of the ingredients to make it past them and go for a deep run in London.

Ratings used are from the FACEIT Major New Legends Stage
Thursday, 19:45
Complexity	Rating		MIBR	Rating
stanislaw	1.42		FalleN	1.20
ShahZaM	1.40		coldzera	1.18
ANDROID	1.34	vs.	tarik	1.09
yay	1.30		fer	1.00
dephh	1.16		Stewie2K	0.95
Rambo (coach)			YNk (coach)
EGB odds: 14.15			EGB odds: 10.70

They had been counted out in the New Challengers Stage and they were counted out in the New Legends Stage. Still, Complexity made it to the playoffs, losing only one game along the way - to Astralis. They have also had their main players perform admirably—ShahZaM, ANDROID and yay all have ratings higher than 1.30 from the last three games they played. All of that seems great, but there are many asterisks to be taken into account and potential pitfalls this North American squad must avoid as they step on to the stage of the Major and face MIBR, a team full of Major winners.

So let's start with the run they had to get to this point. Complexity beat BIG twice, which is a respectable feat, but other than that the teams they took down since the New Challengers Stage didn't really look all that good. They beat: Space Soldiers, who were playing with a coach, Vega Squadron only after overtime, a fnatic side who ended up being pretty poor overall and G2, who weren't impressive either. It is true that you can only beat the team that is ahead of you and that no one can take Complexity's achievements away from them, but this simply isn't a run that can convince us that they will fare well in the playoffs.

This is the stage of the tournament where a player like coldzera shows his true colors

Their New Legends Stage statistics are also unsustainable, with four players sitting on obscenely-high ratings, while team-wise, they secured 1.11 multikills per round and won 56.3% of rounds in which they had a 4v5 disadvantage. Even if the tournament continued to be played behind closed doors, these numbers wouldn't be kept up, but the fact that they are stepping into a 10,000 people arena, on a stage the likes of which yay, ANDROID and dephh have never played on, makes it even harder to believe Complexity will continue their streak.

With all of these question marks, the MIBR side of things almost doesn't matter in this matchup. The Brazilian-American team has its issues and is far from a polished unit, but they have so much more experience and are a team that tends to rise to the occasion, while Complexity have all the makings of one that will sink under pressure. Just looking at the squads, each of MIBR's members has won at least one Major, while stanislaw is the only player on the opposite side with some notable Big Event achievements.

With FalleN's AWPing on point again, coldzera putting up good numbers as always and fer's bloodlust activated by any sign of fear, this game looks seems like the one where Complexity's run ends, forcing them to settle for gaining experience, which will prove extremely valuable as the season goes on.

Worst major

2018-09-19 23:33

29 replies

Signed up 28-1-2018 xD bro u just saw 1 before haha

2018-09-19 23:35

24 replies

Yes, because as soon as someone starts watching/playing CSGO they sign up for HLTV.

2018-09-19 23:42

19 replies

Always a year before starting...

2018-09-19 23:46

4 replies

prove it or I'll...

2018-09-19 23:59

1 reply

U FBI agent

2018-09-20 08:59

FACEIT Major QuarterFinals Teams Analysis! compLexity Style: Tactical and old school, use the lurker quite frequently and have very collective and rehearsed plays; Weakness: Lack of experience in Majors; Quality: Map Pool for MD3 and great variation. MiBR Style: Methodical, slow and unpredictable; Weakness: Short training time to structure the map pool; Quality: Experience, line-up champion of Major and high growth in playoffs. BIG Style: Extremely tactical and counts on the individual of Owen "smooya" Butterfield in freestyle; Weakness: Inconsistency; Quality: Map Pool extensive and a strong individual game in clutches situations. Natus Vincere Style: Methodical and aggressive; Weakness: Depends greatly on the individual talent of Oleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev and a good game of Denis "electronic" Sharipov; Quality: Just have two monsters in the team, like s1mple and electronic. Astralis Style: Tactical, creative and unpredictable; Weakness: Against creative teams, they end up being easily surprised; Quality: Creativity, extensive map pool, good use of grenades and the best rounds reading today. FaZe Style: Fast, aggressive and intimidating; Weakness: They do not know how to deal with teams that do not fight in their domains; Quality: It has the team with the most skills in the world, where all five athletes can reverse rounds, even at great disadvantages. Liquid Style: Unpredictable, disciplined and versatile; Weakness: Players flounder at critical times; Quality: Very strong momentum, absurd evolution, very strong map pool and a completely unpredictable game. HellRaisers Style: Methodical and aggressive; Weakness: Depends very much on the individual talent of Issa "ISSAA" Murad and Özgür "woxic" Eker; Quality: It has a collective work done with decency in the last months, providing great evolution of the team, besides having two decisive players like w0xic and ISSAA

2018-09-20 03:19

wtf is that logic

2018-09-20 10:23

+1 lmao

hahaha lmao someone signed for forum site at the begining of this year lmao rofl lul xd and what is the point?

2018-09-20 00:18

3 replies

Hahahahahaha the point

2018-09-20 01:29

lolololololol jajajajaj the point

2018-09-20 03:06

nt prokda

2018-09-20 03:21

Even if he signed up in 2016 he still hasn't seen enough of them to say which is the worst.

2018-09-20 01:08

8 replies

No, he has. PGL Krakow was easily the worst one. Nt tho

2018-09-20 06:37

7 replies

DId you forget Cluj?

2018-09-20 06:45

6 replies

Cluj wasnt as bad as pgl krakow.

2018-09-20 06:46

5 replies

Why you think that? I mean besides the horrible performances by the teams. Actual production & viewer experience wasnt that bad. (Besides this whole crowd being kicked out thing)

2018-09-20 06:47

Cluj was way worst than PGL, most boring major imo

2018-09-20 06:56

Most boring? You mean the least predictable major. In terms of boringness, easily ESL Cologne 2016

2018-09-20 06:58

2 replies

ESL was nice

2018-09-20 07:12

I personally wasn’t invested in that major, i had a lot going on in my life at that time so I couldn’t watch some matches and the ones I did watch seemed like normal matches (Also I’m from NA and no one did that good from here. If I remember right they only one like one or two matches out of 3 teams)

2018-09-20 10:03

xxxxD

2018-09-20 02:04

Doesn't matter when he signed up. It doesn't change the fact.

2018-09-20 03:47

Guys dont trust gg.bet fkin scam site my withdrawls block after my account block fkin gg.bet

2018-09-20 07:29

2017 acc also questionable

2018-09-20 09:07

Can only hope navi win.. big is looking in good form..

2018-09-20 03:05

Because mouz still shit XDD

2018-09-20 07:09

Nt prokda

2018-09-20 09:53

sweet well done

Ez mibr

gl Astrails bring it home!

10 replies

it's gonna be either them or Liquid. at least 2nd place is guaranteed hahah may the best win!

2018-09-20 00:45

9 replies

Either mibr or liquid.

2018-09-20 00:52

Srsly?did you forget the 16-0 win lmao...

2018-09-20 04:17

1 fluke map by Astralis.

2018-09-20 04:22

Lol

2018-09-20 04:23

nah, mibr is a complete mess.

2018-09-20 05:34

Mibr getting the legends spot is a fluke

2018-09-20 08:18

No because Astralis and Liquid are gonna meet in the semi-final 😢

2018-09-20 02:43

You mean FaZe and Liquid...

2018-09-20 04:29

fuck i didn't see that oh well alright, no 2nd place guaranteed then hahah

2018-09-20 05:32

Nice

- edward ffs

2018-09-19 23:34

-edward +h0bbit and Navi win next major 100%

2018-09-20 05:52

Mby adren better

2018-09-20 09:09

ez complexity

Ez navi and complexity

this is major!

is it?

2018-09-20 00:06

worst

11 replies

You're the worst.

2018-09-20 02:11

expected from smooya and UK scene Robban and olof swedish. nt

2018-09-20 02:14

UK players in Major Quarter Final = 2 Swedish players in Major Quarter Final = 1

2018-09-20 02:19

BRcs>UKcs>Mohammedcs(swedistan)

2018-09-20 04:26

Brazilians at major= 4 Uk's at major= 2 population of brazil= 200 mil population of UK= 65 mil 1 out of 50 million brazilians are at the major 1 out of 30 million Uk's are at the major Therefore, being Uk is better if you want to go to major confirmed

2018-09-20 05:56

BR WIN 2 MAJOR UK??????????

2018-09-20 08:30

1 of 10 million swedes at major. Sweden CS > UK cs

2018-09-20 09:17

6 of 6 million danes at major Danish CS > Swedish CS > UK CS > BR CS

2018-09-20 10:42

1 out of 5 million norwegians 1 out of 3 million bosnians Bosnian cs>norwegian cs>swedish cs

2018-09-20 10:52

BRCS couldnt win esl belo horizonte in their own country lmao

2018-09-20 08:20

where's india on the scene? call ur mate Gandhi

2018-09-20 18:16

face it is trying really hard this major, i respect this. Reminds me somehow of dota, atleast all this work on videos, footage etc

who the fuk needs this vidoes footage etc. ppl watch this sh,it game ( wathc i mean launch stream and go play some other games) for free boxes rofl.

2018-09-20 07:04

You are mistaken. A lot of people watch them and I think that's pretty cool

2018-09-20 09:22

2018-09-20 15:40

All players on BIG have to deliver big time and NaVi has to show some kind of weakness in form, otherwise NaVi will take it.

Lets go mibr

Wtf Stan with a 1.42.

Against fnatic, G2 and BIG

2018-09-20 00:09

still he was bot with liquid

2018-09-20 00:13

mibr vs col OMEGALUL wasted spot in semis

2018-09-19 23:41

Means free final for navi

2018-09-20 05:12

So izy to by ma boy Marcelo Godzera David, the best to ever hold a mouse and a keyboard.

nowhere close to the top

2018-09-20 00:10

The best ever in baiting teammates, yes

2018-09-20 08:21

Go BIG

2018-09-19 23:47

interesting

2018-09-19 23:49

nice pause between the games

2018-09-19 23:53

coL make it to finals vs Liquid E zZzz

2018-09-20 00:05

electronic now is high rated player than bots1mple & more stable

lol all fanboys crying saying "worst major" just bc their teams are shit rn

2018-09-20 00:38

2018-09-20 00:57

2-0 BIG 16:12 dust2 16:14 overpass

2018-09-20 01:02

navi will ez paste big anyway

2018-09-20 01:15

Edward 0.81 OMEGALUL

2018-09-20 01:17

I believe in coL and they will play well tomorrow.

2018-09-20 01:19

Its not smooya vs simple or tabsen vs electronic Its edward vs tizian

2018-09-20 01:38

ROFL that's so true

2018-09-20 03:20

Coldzera will take the baiting strats into another level in this major

2018-09-20 01:43

I think MIBR got a lucky draw and takes it. But their play is flawed and they will be ousted next round. It was a good run CoL. Big shocks the world and beats NaVi with better strats and team play.

2018-09-20 02:16