Natus Vincere vs Team Liquid

ELEAGUE CS:GO Premier 2018 ,

Were into the semi-finals here at the Eleague Premier 2018 and we have two teams that I feel were expected to make the playoffs in their respective groups; Navi and Team Liquid. Both of these squads have shown much promise and the future looks bright, however on this day one of these teams will topple the other and as we dive into the maps pools and the individual players on each team, the answer as to who will win shall become more clear.

Navi :

Navi has been playing at an astonishing rate these past few months and every time I bring them up when it comes to giving a tip, I have been saying this. Navi doesn't seem like they will be slowing down anytime soon. Even with a few off performances this event, S1mple is still positive by 38 kills and his rival and teammate Electronic is hot on his heels with being positive by 23 kills. The impact these two individuals can have on around outweighed the negative effects of the in-game leader Zuez. Zuez himself is actually improving tremendously in his playstyle and I'm glad to see him taking more responsibility for why the team as a whole wasn't winning 6 months ago.

Navi's map pool looks like this; Mirage is 14-2, Inferno is 6-6, Overpass is 9-2, Train is 8-1, Nuke is 6-1, Dust 2 is 0-4, and Cache is 0-1

Team Liquid :

Team Liquid has been looking solid at this event. Even though they have only faced two teams; Astralis and MIBR, they have dominated MIBR. Astralis took them for a ride and did what Astralis does. However, defeating MIBR in two best of three series is nothing to scoff at. Currently, NAF and Twitzz are way positive in the kills department and are fighting for the MVP spot this event. Twitzz is 48 kills positive and NAF is 43 kills positive. Now being positive in kills isn't everything, but not dying and giving up equipment and money to the enemy team helps in a big way. I'm glad to see Team Liquid solidifying themselves and becoming the undisputable best team in North America,

Team Liquid's map pool looks like this; Inferno is 12-7, Cache is 8-1, Mirage is 3-5, Nuke is 3-5, Dust 2 is 4-3, Train is 3-4, and Overpass is 1-0

Map Pick/Ban :

This is a best of three series, each team will ban out two maps, pick two maps, and the leftover map will be the decider. Navi and Team Liquid have diverse pools that will affect one another and the map ban will be of high importance. Team Liquid will ban out Navi's Train and Overpass. Navi will have to ban their worse maps; Dust 2 and Cache. Leading to a series of Mirage, Inferno, and Nuke.

Final Thoughts:

Though the map pick/ban doesn't negatively or positively effect either team the series will likely go three maps. Each team will get a pick that favors them and we will have to go to a third map which has an equal win-rate across both teams and will come down to raw skill. In this case, I feel Navi have a much higher skill cap and should be able to edge out Liquid. It will be a close one guaranteed so unless you like giving yourself a heart attack, try to go smaller here. Low/Medium bet on Navi.