DreamHack Atlanta 2018 Betting Predictions
Dreamhack Open Atlanta starts this weekend, and it should be a fun one to watch. Lots of teams we don’t see very often are coming out to compete, a couple of my favorite players are going to be competing, and hopefully, we’ll get some good games. Below I’ll take a look at my predictions for DreamHack Atlanta and showing you how to make money betting on the tournament!
All the odds mentioned in this article were pulled from Betway unless noted otherwise), which is the site we’re recommending for Non-US bettors to bet on Dreamhack Atlanta. If you live in the US we’ve got you covered too. We recommend SportsBetting.ag or BetOnline for US residents to bet on this tournament.
Opening Matchups
compLexity (-250) – Envy (+175)
This is Envy’s LAN debut, and unfortunately, they’re up against one of the better teams at the event. compLexity is two weeks removed from a close best-of-three loss to OpTic gaming and will likely come out firing on all cylinders.
Envy’s lineup has already gone through changes since their inception, despite having only played 20 games as a team. They removed SEMPHIS and have added Pollo as a stand-in, formerly from Ghost. Even beyond the changes they’ve made, their roster construction is a little haphazard. They have Nifty and JDM, both of whom have been fairly successful AWPers in NA. (This in particular pains me, as Nifty was one of my favorite players when he was on Renegades.)
So far Nifty has been rifling pretty much fulltime, although I’d keep my eye peeled for a potential double AWP setup from Envy. They haven’t looked very good online so far, having only played four games as a full team. That being said, they might be interesting on LAN. They aren’t devoid of talent and should be hungry coming into the tournament.
compLexity on the other hand look like they’re in form. Everyone is playing great, and I really haven’t been able to sing their praises enough. They haven’t played a game since the 8th of this month, which means they should show up and be ready to play. It’s a little scary to not have much info on what Envy is going to be doing, but stanislaw should be able to pull the game out without much trouble.
Ghost (+110) – Vitality (-154)
Vitality is another team making it’s LAN debut this weekend. It seems as though they’re already the best French team, given G2’s struggles and recent roster changes. They’re going to be facing off against Ghost, who are coming off a 5-6th place finish at cs_summit 3, losing to OpTic second round of the loser’s bracket.
This lineup has the potential to be top five, if everyone plays up to their level. Happy’s in game leading is a little worrying, but their combined firepower is definitely scary. This is also the first time the French have added new blood in a while, with the heralded 18-year-old ZywOo playing on his first real professional team. He has been dominant thus far through the online games they’ve played, and this will be his first outing against real talent on LAN. Honestly, I’m just really excited to watch these guys play. There’s a vacuum in the French scene right now, and they’re absolutely poised to take the top spot.
eUnited (+120) – Luminosity (-167)
This is one of the only matchups at the tournament where the teams have any sort of matchup history. Luminosity won their last matchup 2-0 at IEM Chicago, but they are pretty much even at 6-7 over their lifetime.
eUnited are another fairly young team, and the just picked up Cooper- from Swole Patrol in what turned out to be a complete disaster. FNS is leading the team, and he’s on his third team this year. eUnited haven’t had much time with this roster, and frankly I don’t like their chances against LG.
LG is a much older roster, and they beat eUnited pretty soundly last time they met. Luminosity has more talent, and really should be able to put eUnited down without much trouble.
Fragsters (-125) – Rogue (-112)
This is a really hard matchup to predict, seeing as how these teams have never played each other and there isn’t a lot of indication as to how these teams are going to play on LAN.
Storylines
This tournament has a lot of compelling potential matchups that I wanted to highlight. It’s really only a tier two tournament, but since we don’t see these teams all that often there’s a couple of neat little storylines.
The first-timers
Obviously the biggest thing viewers are going to be looking at is the LAN debut of Vitality. This lineup has been heralded for a while as the new “French Superteam” and they’ve been performing well online. ZywOo is one of the most talked about prospects in CS:GO right now, and it’ll be exciting to see if he can put up numbers at his first LAN. RPK is always a joy to watch, and I am personally interested to see how Happy does as the IGL. He got a lot of flak for his in-game-leading on Envy, so I want to see if he’s going to adapt and move away from the lurk heavy style he has played traditionally.
An underrated but similar story is Envy’s first LAN. I really like Nifty, and JDM, and this team isn’t too dissimilar from compLexity in their construction. They’re lacking the veteran leadership that coL has in ShaHzaM and stanislaw, but they have a lot of exciting, high upside young guys. Whether JDM can hit his ceiling again like he did on Liquid is yet to be seen, but this team could legitimately make waves in NA, and maybe internationally. (Although it may be with a slightly different roster)
Something to prove
compLexity is +400 to win this tournament, right after Vitality. This tournament is a great measuring stick to figure out how real compLexity is. They lost to OpTic at cs_summit 3, which is a respectable loss, but this is the kind of tournament you win if you are a top ten team. Vitality is still too young of a team to really be in contention to win this event, which makes compLexity the favorite, far and away. If they can’t clean this tournament up, against tier two competition, I will have serious doubts about their bid for a spot in the top 10.
Redemption
One of these players, on one of these teams, doesn’t belong. I’ll give you three guesses who it is… that’s right, it’s MSL. He went from a top 10 team to a team that’s barely top 10 in NA. It’s a herculean task that has been placed before him, but it’s time to see if he can pull this team of misfits up by their bootstraps into the top tier of NA.
He has some nice assets to work with, Hiko and Rickeh especially, although a lot will depend on the level of production he can coax out of SicK and vice, their two younger players. It is entirely possible for MSL to elevate them to coL levels of play, and it would certainly be nice to have Hiko back in the tier one scene, but it would be a long road. Seeing how this is their first LAN, that road would likely start here.
Outrights
Looking at the lines for this event, I liked what GG.bet had to offer for their outright bets so in the following section, all the odds are from gg.bet except the winner odds.
Winner
On Betway you can get Vitality favored at +300, compLexity and Luminosity are at +400, Ghost is +750. The best values here are likely coL and Ghost. I personally think coL should be the favorite here, so +400 is really good. I also think that Ghost has an outside chance to take the event. It’s likely they’ll make it out of their group, and they are one of the oldest lineups in attendance.
I would bet on Steel having prepared for the event, and they’ll be coming in trying to bounce back from cs_summit. I like them a lot for this bet, I’d put some money down on them or coL.
Win the group
All you need is two best-of-one wins to make it out of your group in winners, which is going to help upset teams and teams with smaller map pools. The first match in Group B is Ghost vs. Vitality, so whichever team wins that match is likely to make it out of their pool. Vitality is at +150 to make win their group, and Ghost is +400, so I’d suggest a bet on Ghost.
Group A’s opener is coL vs. Envy, and the second match is eUnited vs. LG. compLexity and LG are both +150 to win their group, so I would suggest a bet on coL if you want to wager on this one. I don’t think they odds are great though, so I would suggest a stay away.
Make the finals
The only really interesting bet here is Ghost at +420. compLexity and Vitality are favored by a lot, so I don’t think there’s much value there.
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