ESL One: New York 2018 Tournament Preview
ESL One: New York 2018 is a premier CS:GO tournament attended by 8 of the world’s best teams and having a substantial prize pool of $250.000. The event is scheduled to take place between September 26th – 30th and provides plenty of CS:GO betting opportunities.
ESL One: New York 2018 participants and format
ESL One: New York 2018 brings together 8 strong teams from Europe, CIS and North America. These teams will be divided into 2 groups of 4.
Group A: Natus Vincere, mousesports, Fnatic, Gambit Esports.
Group B: FaZe Clan, Team Liquid, NRG Esports, G2 Esports.
Both of these groups will be played in a double-elimination bracket format (GSL). All matches will be Bo3. The top 2 teams from each group advance to the Semifinals.
ESL One: New York 2018 betting predictions
Natus Vincere vs. Gambit Esports
Na’Vi is one of the world’s strongest teams and the vice-champion of the recent FACEIT Major: London 2018. In the last 4-5 months, Na’Vi had a very dominating performance, achieving top placements at almost every event it attended. Examples include: 3rd – 4th place at ESL Pro League Season 7 Finals, 1st place at StarSeries & i-League CS:GO Season 5, 1st place at CS:GO Asia Championships 2018, 1st place at ESL One: Cologne 2018, 3rd – 4th place at ELEAGUE CS:GO Premier 2018 and 2nd place at FACEIT Major: London 2018.
No doubt, with all of these achievements and one of the strongest duos in CS:GO at the moment (s1mple + electronic), Na’Vi goes into ESL One: New York 2018 as one of the main contenders to claim the title. Their only real opponents are Team Liquid and FaZe Clan.
On the other side, Gambit Esports has had a long series of poor and mediocre results this year, including a 20th – 22nd place at FACEIT Major: London 2018, a 13th – 16th place at DreamHack Masters Stockholm 2018 and a 13th – 16th place at ESL One: Cologne 2018. On top of this, Hobbit has been transfer-listed, so the team is sure to go through a great deal of internal turmoil.
The contrast between these two teams couldn’t be greater. And given that this is a Bo3, not a Bo1, Na’Vi’s chances of winning are very close to 100%.
Betway puts the odds for this match at 1.10 – 5.75 in favor of Na’Vi, regarding the whole dispute as a guaranteed way to make money by betting on the favorite. And they’re right.
ESL One: New York 2018 betting prediction: Natus Vincere to win.
Fnatic vs. mousesports
Prior to ESL One: New York 2018, Fnatic went through a pretty long underperformance tunnel at the end of which there wasn’t exactly light, but a roster change. Flusha, one of the long standing members of Fnatic, was transferred to Cloud9. His temporary stand-in however is a very famous player known as ScreaM. This guy is an absolute beast when it comes to headshots and accuracy, but we’ve yet to see if the current version of Fnatic has the leadership it takes to place high in important events.
mousesports is in a similar spot as Fnatic, but its roster is way more stable. Personally, I still regard STYKO’s transfer to Cloud9 and his replacement with Snax as a big mistake which has had a big impact on the team. However, mousesports’ performance over the last several months was decent, although it fluctuated quite a bit: 3rd – 4th place at StarSeries & i-League CS:GO Season 5, 2nd place at ESL One: Belo Horizonte 2018, 9th – 12th place at ESL One: Cologne 2018, 3rd – 4th place at ELEAGUE CS:GO Premier 2018, 3rd – 4th place at DreamHack Masters Stockholm 2018 and 15th – 16th place at FACEIT Major: London 2018.
Going into this match, mousesports is clearly the favorite, as Fnatic is in disarray at the moment. Only a monstrous performance by ScreaM or someone else on the team could save it from certain defeat in this match.
Betway puts the odds at 2.55 – 1.45 in favor of mousesports, giving Fnatic a lot of credit for virtually nothing to speak of except the addition of a potentially strong fragger. But even this addition came at the cost of the team’s short-term cohesion. And against a team like mousesports, that lack of fluency and coordination will most likely prove lethal.
ESL One: New York 2018 betting prediction: mousesports to win.
FaZe Clan vs. G2 Esports
In spite of its average results in recent months, FaZe Clan is much stronger than it seems, especially in a tournament like ESL One: New York 2018. That’s because it has a world-class roster that’s very hard to beat, and its losses at recent events came against formidable opponents such as Astralis.
FaZe Clan placed 3rd – 4th at ESL One: Cologne 2018, 5th – 8th at ELEAGUE CS:GO Premier 2018, 5th – 8th at DreamHack Masters Stockholm 2018 and 5th – 8th at FACEIT Major: London 2018. Against top teams, FaZe Clan is likely to struggle. But against weaker opponents such as G2 Esports, it is almost certain to succeed. Niko and his squad may not be at the top of their game right now, but they’re still a top 5 team for sure.
On the other side, G2 Esports hadn’t been seen prior to FACEIT Major: London 2018 for a long time. Then they participated in this tournament and failed to qualify for its Playoffs Stage, going 2 W – 3 L in the New Legends Stage. In particular, the last of those 3 losses came against FaZe Clan (score 0 – 2). That loss, combined with the team’s overall roster and playstyle issues make it an easy target for FaZe in this match.
Betway puts the odds at 1.15 – 4.75 in favor of FaZe Clan, assessing that in a Bo3, G2 Esports has almost no chance of winning against a CS:GO powerhouse such as FaZe.
ESL One: New York 2018 betting prediction: FaZe Clan to win.
Team Liquid vs. NRG Esports
Arguably, Team Liquid has never looked stronger. And the only reason why it doesn’t win big tournaments is Astralis. Liquid lost no less than 3 Grand Finals and a Semifinal against this Nemesis in the past 5 months, which must feel really bad for TACO and his squad. But apart from this team and possibly Na’Vi, I don’t see anyone being able to beat Team Liquid in its current form. The great news for Liquid is that Astralis is not present at this event, so Na’Vi will be the only real opponent on the path to the title.
On the other side, we have NRG Esports, a very strong North American team that unfortunately did not participate in the recent FACEIT Major. However, we do have a general idea of how strong it is, because it won a fairly important event in the last 2 months, namely IEM XIII Shanghai.
Over the course of this season, Team Liquid and NRG Esports have won and lost against each other quite often, proving that either could win when a direct match takes place. However, Liquid’s massive improvement that has taken place in recent months definitely makes it the favorite in this confrontation.
Betway puts the odds at 1.25 – 3.55 in favor of Team Liquid, giving NRG Esports a lot of credit simply because of its past results against this CS:GO giant. We’ll have to see what happens this time, at ESL One: New York 2018, but I do believe that Liquid will prevail in its current form.
ESL One: New York 2018 betting prediction: Team Liquid to win.
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