ESL Pro League Season 8 Take Aways – Buy/Sell After EPL S8

December 12, 2018 9:45 am By: Steven Burnley

It’s finally time for another buy/sell column. It’s getting close to Major time, so we need to asses whose stock is going up, and whose stock is going down. The EPL Finals gave us a lot of tape to watch, and revealed a lot about the tier two teams in attendance.

Buy – Best CS:GO Teams to Bet On

Liquid

Liqui’s loss to Astralis was the most successful 1-3 loss I’ve ever seen.  Liquid managed to steal a map on what was their permaban, which could have big implications in a best-of-three. Turning Train into an asset is going to help Liquid tremendously in the pick/ban stages against Astralis and will help them avoid Nuke, which clearly wasn’t working for them.

In addition to their tactical revelation, EliGE had one of the best series he’s had in a while. He had a monster performance on Train, 23-15 in 24 rounds with 102.6 ADR, and was one of Liquid’s best performers over the best-of-three. Unfortunately for Liquid this wasn’t one of Twistzz’s standout games. It appears he might be in a mini slump, after his underperformance at the ECS Finals. He played better at SuperNova Malta, but that was against a much lower level of competition, and he still wasn’t quite the budding superstar we’ve seen him be in recent times, hovering around the middle of the scoreboard.

If EliGE, NAF, and Twistzz can all finally have a strong tournament at the Major, and they can get the pick ban to go their way, they could make some serious noise against Astralis.

HellRaisers

HellRaisers are the second-best CIS team right now, and I don’t think it’s close. That is, if HellRaisers is considered a CIS team, I don’t know. Either way, they are looking like a serious up and comer, with strong young talents in woxic and ISSAA, an acclaimed IGL in ANGE1, and a veteran (even though he’s only 24) in Hobbit. They have some solid wins over the last couple months or so, beating ENCE and Renegades and taking a map off Astralis.

The thing that excites me most about HellRaisers is the roster move I think they should make. As of the first of December, AdreN is a free agent. Pairing him with Hobbit again would bring HellRaisers to another level and provide the perfect backdrop for woxic and ISSAA to take another step up. If AdreN can play like he did when Gambit won the Major, this could be a top 5 team in the word.

Mousesports

Mouz picked up a couple solid wins at the EPL Finals, and they seem to be getting back into their old, pre-Snax form (albeit slowly). They didn’t pick up any significant wins at the EPL Finals, unless you count a 2-0 over Na’Vi, but what is most encouraging about their performance is that they didn’t have any over performances from any individual players, aside from Oskar against Renegades. I would expect for this group of players to have better individual performances, so it’s refreshing both to see them hang around in games despite an underperformance and to see them playing the game the right way, whether the shots fall or not.

Renegades

Renegades had a good tournament at the EPL Finals. They trounced BIG 2-1 and put up a solid showing against Mousesports, who knocked them out at 5th-6th place. JKS had a great tournament, putting up some of the best numbers at the event. He was the top performer out of everyone attending over 12 maps, which bodes well for the Renegades. jkaem played well as well, which they’re going to need if they want to put up a fight at IEM Katowice.

I don’t know what the ceiling is for this team. I can’t imagine it’s very high, but they certainly looked impressive last weekend.

Sell – CS:GO Teams to Bet Against

BIG

After a solid performance at the FACEIT Major London, I was in on BIG. Gob B seemed to be a great IGL, smooya was playing like a top 15 player, nex looked good for the first time in a while. I thought this was going to be a team that would stick around for a while, maybe even win a couple tier two tournaments.

Instead they seem to have fallen apart. Smooya can’t seem to hit his Major level again, they aren’t playing the precise style I’d expect to see from a Gob B team, it just isn’t working. I can’t imagine this team is going to play well at the Major, unless we see smooya kick it up a notch.

CompLexity

They didn’t play at the EPL Finals but talking about BIG reminded me. coL have not followed up on their (relative) success at the Major. I was a big fan of theirs coming out of London and I was expecting them to put up results. I liked their team a lot, I like stanislaw. It feels like they should be better than they are, but they just can’t put it together. I would hope to see a roster change soon, ideally to pick up a star, although they’re in short supply nowadays.

Na’Vi

I was never super excited about Na’Vi. Yes, s1mple is pretty good, but they don’t have the depth or the consistency to regularly make finals runs in tournaments. I think that they are another team that’s primed for a roster change, although I’m not sure what they would do.

Last time they kicked Zeus he won a Major with a different team, and a worse team no less. It would seem as though the problem lies elsewhere in this team, and I don’t know where. Presumably Edward would be the one to go, we’ll see if they make a change before the Major.

North

North got 2-0’d by Shark Esports. Sell.

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