FURIA eSports vs INTZ e-Sports

Americas Minor - IEM Katowice 2019

In this tip, we will be taking a close look at a best of three match-up between teams INTZ and FURIA in the upper bracket semi-final of the Americas Minor - IEM Katoice 2019. FURIA is currently favored in this matchup with the current odds at time of writing being a 1.71; however, they are not the team I am predicting to win this series. I feel strongly towards the underdog opposition of INTZ. Let's dive into detail and back up why I feel this way.

INTZ:

INTZ has been the home of many Brazilian roster changes over the entire duration of 2018. What started as it's own team and own organization, they soon dropped their entire team in order to pick up the majority of the former NTC team created by two-time major winner 'FNX'. NTC would go on to attempt to qualify for the last major in Boston, but would ultimately fall just shy of getting in. Since that time, 'FNX' has seemingly retired, 'KNG' and 'Chelo' remain on INTZ, 'Felps' has rejoined his former roster as the fifth for MIBR and 'Bit' has teamed up with TeamOne. As for the players currently on INTZ, it is a mixture of old an new and you will recognize'Yel' and 'Destiny' from former Luminosity squad variants. 'Xand' was on the original INTZ team to then move over to 'Yeah!' and then rejoining the squad again, but this time with a little more firepower. So far this event, major finalist and primary AWPer 'KNG' has shown what his true potential really is; a hyper-carry without any regard for the other team, a fragging style of complete disrespect that also haunts the minds of his opponents. He has truly been the X-factor for this team thus far and I believe he will continue to show his presence in the server.

FURIA:

FURIA is a team that recently started making headlines similarly in the way that the SpaceSoldiers did just a few years ago. They had a single stand-out player that was showing up on the front page of HLTV as the "highest rated player". 'Yuurih' is that player and FURIA is his team. And though we are in a time in counter-strike where we beginning to have multiple teams with a single-carry type player; 'S1mple' and 'Zywoo' are a couple names for reference. But in this Brazilian line-up, I find the results too spotty to really label this team as one that can go the distance. Even in the case of 'S1mple' or 'Zywoo' they at least have former champions and strong players surrounding them to make up for the when the carry doesn't show up. FURIA has a select few besides 'Yuurih' but I find that the majority of the team is roughly average.

Maps:

A best of three is boiled down to two bans from each team and the remainder is played out. INTZ will want to ban Nuke and Train, while FURIA will ban out Dust2 and Overpass, opting for Cache, Mirage and Inferno.

Final Statement:

The basis of my theory that the underdog of INTZ will take down FURIA is that I feel that INTZ has the higher skill ceiling and with the way that KNG is playing along with the rest of the team supporting him and following suit, FURIA will have to have all of their carries show up and for the rest of the team to play above average in order to give INTZ a real fight for the victory.