IEM Katowice Major 2019 Legend Stage - Betting Predictions

After one week of challenger stage the Katowice Major is now approaching its legend stage to which will consist of 16 teams.

In this post we will have a look at each team and their map pool and rank them in a seeding.

Actual betting-tips can be found in this post.

#1 Astralis

Astralis is by far the most professional team on and aside the server. In most aspects of the game, they are one level above the other top5 teams but still can lose a best-of-one on maps like overpass or mirage.

Looking at two of the other top5 teams who might be title contender (nrg & liquid), their map pool is looking pretty great.

Their last showing was the ibuypower-tournament which they took pretty light (per statements in interviews) which made them lose to liquid in the final.

All in all its hard to argue to put them at any other seed than #1.

#2 Liquid

While the event being a shitshow, liquids last showing at ibuypower was pretty successful as they could finally beat their nemesis astralis in the final.

They recently traded taco to mibr for stewie and also added adren as coach.

Taco played important support roles in liquid and was the good soul of the team.

Stewie probably wont fit in this role that's why we most likely will see a new system or even map pool from liquid - this could enable them to beat astralis constantly or could fail completely.

Team Liquid will be our #2 seed.

#3 NRG

NRG probably had the easiest challenger stage but nevertheless looked hot, not dropping a single map.

They don't have any tournament-wins on their belt apart from cs_summit which makes them fly a bit under the radar but they have a strong map pool for best-of-threes and can compete with teams like astralis on overpass.

Nrg will be our seed #3.

#4 mibr

The legendary Brazilian SK-gaming lineup of 2016 is back under mibr flag.

They also added zews, one of the coaches who can mess with the minds of astralis, so we might see a completely different map pool from this team.

The last event for mibr was Blast Lisbon but where they still played with Stewie and Tarik - all of this makes it kind of hard to rate this team but motivation wise this team is probably the most motivated of the top5 teams.

If the team lives up to its potential they are our dark horse to win the tournament but this might as well not be their time yet. Thats why made in brazil will be our #4 seed.

#5 Faze

Faze last showing was at ELeague Invitational, where newest addition/stand-in Adren didn't have a strong game even tho they won the event in the end.

They recently added former mibr coach ynk who has a long history with Fazes star-player niko. Let's hope the coach will be able to take some weight of nikos shoulders because it will be hard for him to keep ingame-leading while fragging vs tier1 teams.

All of Fazes players belong to the top best in the game which puts them above teams like BIG or HELLRAISERS but them not having a stable lineup or proper ingame-leader makes them the weakest of the top5 teams.

#6 BIG

The germans recently added former spacesoldiers top-fragger and fpl legend xantares who even moved to berlin to play with big.

After a surgery nex was planned to sit out for a while but had to return early to fill in for smooya, who decided to leave the team after having the feeling of not fitting in the gameplan of the team.

Their performance in this tournament depends on if gob b had enough time to adjust to the loss of smoya and the addition of xantares, if so we might see some much stronger BIG as their recent showing at the ELeague Invitational suggests (still with smooya).

What speaks for this is that the team was already planning to remove smooya after the major if it would not work out.

The newly won fragging-power of xantares combined with the aces, their ingame-leader gobb always has up his sleave, make big our #6 seed.

#7 ENCE

The finish esports organization ENCE showed a lot of problems at the challenger stage, particular with closing out games.

This is pretty surprising for a team that is known for his calm mindset and which probably has the best midround calls outside the top5.

The team probably comes into the tournament with a little less preparation than the other challengers because their team captain allu just got father and went to visit his newborn for 2 days.

Nevertheless, they have a strong best-of-three map pool which matches other none-top5-teams well - thats why the finns will be seed #7.

#8 NAVI

It becomes more and more apparent that navi is facing an internal crisis. What was always a rumor is pretty much official since the zews-hltv-interview or this

So it looks like the team did not bootcamp and did not do any special preparation for the major. With that, they will pretty much rely on firepower which only 3 1/2 players of the team have.

Still, they have by far the strongest player in the game in their team which makes them our #8 seed.

#9 Hellraisers

Hellraisers last showing at LAN was at PLG grand slam where they lost to G2 They also lost and 2-0 to vitality in lock and load (online) and 1-2 to optic in iem sydney qualy which was online as well.

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Their newest addition hobbit looks like a good fit to the team of legendary CIS-ingame-leader ANG1.

The team can do some damage to big names in a bo1 but probably have a low chance to survive a best-of-three versus one of the top5 teams.

Thats why hellraisers will be out #9 seed.

#10 AVANGAR

The CIS-team had a pretty solid showing at the challenger stage and only lost to renegades, who were kind of a surprise to everyone.

Looking at the stats they have a strong map pool even for the best-of-threes coming up, but yet have to be tested against tier1 opposition.

That's why Avangar will only be seed #10.

#11 Cloud9

While Cloud9 initially surprised with decent results they are also known for their missing consistency.

Looking at their performance at the challenger stage rush and automatic didn't seem to start well.

Rushs performance during the challenger stage

Their shallow map pool will also cause problems for them in best-of-threes, that's why the international mix will end up as our seed #11.

#12 Renegades

Renegades were the most surprising team at the challenger stage.

They have been bootcamping in katowice for weeks and seem to have benefited from that greatly.

The Aussies managed to surprise by extending their map pool and winning nuke vs ENCE. We might see some surprise-picks from in this stage as well but this probably won't work vs teams of higher caliber like astralis, faze or mibr. That's why renegades will only be seed #12.

#13 Vitality

Vitality did not look very promising in the challenger stage and won twice in overtime (vs Grayhound and vici), which they could as well have lost.

at least they are more consistent than G2, whatever that means

Often fall flat when their star-player zywoo is not on point.

The French will be our seed #13.

#14 NIP

NIP had some strong comebacks vs weaker teams in challenger stage but the fact that they have been behind so much is kind of worrying.

The only map they looked very good on was inferno and even there they relied on individual performance most of the time.

With a different outcome of a few rounds, NIP could as well be at the same point fnatic is now - out of the tournament. Also their ingame-leader still seems to level himself in vetos. That's why we seed them at a controversial 14th seed.

#15 G2

G2 has a shallow map pool and is missing the star-power of a zywoo or niko.

They barely made it out of the challenger stage and its hard to find a team in the tournament apart from complexity they should be favored over.

G2 will make our #15 seed.

#16 Complexity

What exactly are they doing here? The Americans didn't need to qualify for this stage due to their placing at the last major.

But today they are playing with n0thing as stand-in whos best times are probably over and the lineup as a whole is only a shadow of the team it has been the last major. That's why we have to put complexity as our last seed #16.