Counter-Strike Global Offensive: The World Championships 2015

A world first for the Counter Strike scene, this weekend will see countries, rather than teams or organisations, represented by players in a Rugby World Cup-style event. Held in Belgrade, Serbia, 16 nations, ranging from Tunisia to Sweden, will compete for a share in $100,000. I’ll be previewing all 4 groups, telling you who should make it to the playoffs and who should take out the top prize.

Counter-Strike Global Offensive: The World Championships 2015 

GROUP A – Sweden, Serbia, Germany, Indonesia

Just by looking at the teams in this group, it should be very easy to deduce who will be going through. Swedish and German teams have dominated the scene since Counter Strike’s beta in 1999.

Germany has one of the strongest lineups going into the event, with PENTA’s kRYSTAL, tahsiN and Spiidi and Mousesports’ nex and denis. While a strong team on paper, Germany also boasts the advantage of team chemistry, with nex, denis, Spiidi and kRYSTAL being part of the PENTA lineup that managed to defy expectations and make it to the playoffs of ESL One Katowice 2015. Their toughest opponent in the group will be Sweden, but the fragging power of the Germans and their experience playing together should see them come out on top of the group.

Sweden’s side is quite odd. The country boasts some of the greatest teams of all time, with Ninjas in Pyjamas and Fnatic still on top of the scene to this day. However, of those teams, Sweden has managed to secure the services of arguably the worst player from each, Xizt of NiP and pronax of Fnatic. Representing the nation with them are pyth and Devilwalk from Winterfox and pauf of Orbit, Flipsid3 and Property fame. On paper, this side is inferior to Germany and the match should resolve that way.

Indonesia and host-nation Serbia will hopefully put on a good showing against these teams, but they’re highly outclassed in preview and the games will likely tell that same story. Germany will go through in first place, with Sweden in second.

GROUP B – Russia, Kyrgyzstan, Tunisia, TBA

This group has been plagued with issues before the tournament has even begun. Firstly, China were not able to attend due to visa issues. Their spot was given to Portugal, who have now announced that they are not able to attend either. The team to replace them has not been announced, but regardless, this group should be very easy for Russia and will see an unlikely team make the playoffs.

The Russian side is extremely strong and should be favourites going in to place quite highly. The combination of free agent and early-CSGO legend Dosia with Filpsid3’s WorldEdit, NaVi’s seized and flamie and PiTER’s hooch presents a lineup unmatched by both their group and other lineups in the tournament. Russia should have no issues with Kyrgyzstan, Tunisia and the TBA nation, as a thorough and tactical play-style should be expected from this already skilled team.

With a real lack of exposure in the international scene, both Kyrgyzstan and Tunisia come into the event with little experience and almost anonymity. Picking a winner out of these two will be tough, but my money would be with Kyrgyzstan, due to mainly their position in the world and performance in the Asian qualifiers. Being relatively close to nations such as Kazakhstan and Russia, the players would have more chance to catch up with the meta of the scene and play matches against teams in these regions. Additionally, they also had a decently strong showing in the Asian qualifiers, beating group favourite India to make it to the event. However, this prediction is based on the 4th team being unannounced.

GROUP C – France, USA, Poland, Netherlands

The group of death. Unlike Group A and B, Group C features 3 strong lineups in Poland, USA and France, and picking 2 teams to advance is tough. While Netherlands also have some strong individuals, like mikeS, chrisJ and CRUC1AL, they’re definitely the underdogs of this difficult pool.
France, on paper, are easily the strongest lineup in the competition and all bets for a tournament favourite should be going their way. 4 out of 5 of the French squad were part of the LDLC and EnVyUs team that were arguably the best in the world for the period of late 2014 to early 2015. shox, SmithZz, Happy and NBK all saw first placings at events like Dreamhack Winter 2014 and MLG Aspen 2015 and, with possibly the best entry-fragger in the world in apEX, form the French team that look to claim first place in Belgrade. They should go to the playoffs with first seed.

With American superstars Cloud 9 in Melbourne, Australia for the weekend of The World Championships, the USA team is a shell of when it qualified for the event. Consisting of m0E, jdm64, tarik, anger and autimatic, the nation that could’ve been heavy favourites go in a lot lighter. However, they should still see wins over Netherlands and an also depleted Polish side (though, that match will go down to the wire). I see USA claiming 2nd place in their group and possibly making it to the semi-finals with a few strong showings.

Poland have come into the event like USA and Sweden: heavily depleted of the superstars that helped them get to the event in the first place. Their squad for Belgrade combines Lounge Gaming’s SZPERO, innocent and MICHU with Vexed’s peet and Furlan. While this is one of the stronger lineups across the 4 pools, the opponents in their own group make it tough for them to make it to the playoffs. Expect a great deciding match for them against the USA, but I think the edge is slightly in the Americans’ favor.

GROUP D – Canada, Belgium, Norway, Singapore

While not as stacked as Group C, Group D does feature some pretty tough teams that make it extremely hard to decide a winner. Discounting heavy underdogs Singapore, all 3 teams have the potential of beating each other and making the playoffs. However, I see Canada’s experience and Norway’s fire-power just pushing them into the quarter-finals.

Canada have fielded a strong lineup; possibly the strongest that the Canadians could fill. With Semphis of compLexity, and with previous experience in teams like Cloud 9 and Quantic, daps and NAF-FLY from Conquest, FNS of CLG, and DAVEY from 3sUP, Canada brings a lot of skill and knowledge to their team in Serbia. If NAF-FLY can perform like he has on many occasions, I see Canada taking top seed in their group.

For second seed, choosing a winner out of Belgium and Norway is tough. Both teams bring both old and new players to the event and I’d say that their match-up is one to watch over the weekend. Belgium’s mix of experience in ScreaM and Ex6TenZ, young raw skill in to1nou, and the unknown in NpK_ and Davidp makes them quite an unpredictable side. However, the same can be said for Norway. They’ve also brought experience in Skurk and Polly, skill in young-gun Mystic and REASTEN, and the unknown in PAINT. Thus, both teams are quite comparable and make it hard to distinguish a favourite. I’d say the Norwegians will slightly edge out the Belgian side, but the game will be a nail-biter nonetheless.

And there we go. My preview and predictions for the first ever World Championships of Counter Strike. I hope this has been as enjoyable to read as it has for me to write and I welcome any new people to the CSGO scene who have stumbled upon this on GoingFor2.com.

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