Match Prediction: Cloud9 - FaZe Clan | CS2 (CS:GO)
Thunderpick CS:GO World Championship 2023Welcome to EGamersWorld.
We continue to follow the twists and turns of the Thunderpick World Championship 2023. The big $250,000 tournament is making its way to the final stage.
There are 4 teams left in the championship, who will play each other for 2 trips to the grand finals. The first participant of the final will be determined in the match Vp - Heroic, and the second - in the match FaZe - C9. We will talk about the second pair.
FaZe and Cloud9 will play in Bo3 match for the right to go to the final. Both teams deserve to be there, but only one of them will move further.
We will try to figure out who it will be and who is destined to get to the grand final first, and who will leave Thunderpick World Championship 2023 with the top 4 in the standings.
Let's go.
FaZe Clan uniforms
Let's open the match analysis with the analysis of FaZe Clan's form. In this match they will play in the status of the favourite, with odds to win around 1.6.
One of the most stable teams of the season has quite an extensive record in the first half of the year. However, it predominantly consists of "near" top results.
From the main achievements - getting into the top three at BLAST Premier: Spring Groups 2023 and winning at ESL Pro League Season 17. Also this year FaZe got the award for the 4th season of Intel Grand Slam, enriched by $1,000,000.
Speaking of award tournaments, there was less luck here. Top-12 at IEM Rio 2023, and Top-4 at IEM Dallas 2023. At the only Major e in the season FaZe did not cope with the tension, but made it to TOP-8.
Before the Long Conference IEM Cologne 2023 they attended two tournaments of BLAST series: Spring Final 2023 and Fall Groups 2023. At the Finals they were ranked Top 6, and at the Fall Groups 2023 they were in the top three, earning themselves a slot at the Autumn Finals.
- FaZe Clan line-up: karrigan, rain, Twistzz, ropz, broky .
Despite the ubiquitous Reshuffle and rather "average" results for the year, FaZe didn't change the main roster. However, there were some substitutions: FaZe presented a new coach, who became the legendary Pole NEO. On his post he replaced the legendary RobbaN and it affected FaZe's gameplay in IEM Cologne 2023, where FaZe took the top-12.
The setbacks continued from there onwards. At Gamers8 2023 FaZe Clan took a similar place (9-12), Ledgeiv at the Long Segment of the Vp tournament with the score 2-0.
Things didn't go too well at ESL Pro League Season 18. FaZe made it to the play-offs on the top grid of Group C, defeating 9Z Team and Fnatic, but in the match for seeding in the main stage they lost to NaVi with the score 0-2. However, FaZe didn't manage to play long at ESL Pro League Season 18: in the first play-offs match, which for FaZe started from the second stage, the team met MOUZ. The future EPL champions sent FaZe Clan home. As a result FaZe found themselves on the 9-12th place of the top tournament.
FaZe rehabilitated quite quickly. Already at IEM Sydney 2023 they triumphed with the victory over CoL in the grand final.
Thunderpick World Championship 2023 FaZe Clan have a great time. The titular European club passed the group stage without problems becoming the best team of the quartet B, and then took part in the play-offs of the championship.
The first opponent for FaZe in the play-offs of Thunderpick World Championship 2023 was MOUZ. A serious opponent, but FaZe did well: 2-1 in favour of the champions of IEM Sydney 2023.
FaZe Clan Mappool
The best map FaZe - Mirage. They played 12 matches and won 9 of them.
Next were Overpass with 8 matches and 5 wins. Nuke (7 matches, 4 wins), Inferno (9 matches, 5 wins). Worse is Ancient with 3 wins in 6 matches, and worst of all was Anubis. His FaZe was picked 7 times, but played with a winrate of 42%.
Not playing on Vertigo.
Cloud9 Form.
We continue the match breakdown with the analysis of C9's playing form. In this match they will play as an outsider with win odds around 2.1.
C9 have had a very good half of the year. "Cloudy" celebrated a Pass to the grand finals of ESL Pro League Season 17 and a victory at BLAST Premier: Spring European Showdown 2022.
In addition, the team won the commercial BB Playlist. Urbanistic. In April, C9 seriously stumbled: they lost two qualifications at BLAST.tv Paris Major 2023 and missed the only Major of the season.
Next up was a top-4 finish at IEM Rio 2023 and a win at Brazy Party. Before IEM Cologne 2023, C9 failed IEM Dallas 2023 (top-8) and BLAST Premier: Spring Final 2023 (top-8).
- Cloud9 line-up: H0bbit, electroNic, Ax1Le, BoombI4, Perfecto.
Before Gamers8 Cloud9 attended another major summer tournament - IEM Cologne 2023. The most prestigious event went well for Cloud9: not good, but not bad either.
A very difficult Long Corner in Cologne forced Cloud9 to mobilise all their resources in order not to drop out at the group stages, and these resources were enough until the first round of play-offs, where C9 were defeated by Vitality.
Next, C9 visited Gamers8, but even there everything was not so good. At the TOP-8 stage the team faced ENCE, and they were unable to do anything against the overclocked Finns. And that's how they ended up in the TOP-8.
In their debut match at EPL Season 18, Cloud9 played against Eternal Fire. The Turks, being a cheerful team on paper, failed to outplay C9 at least on one of the cards: the match ended with the score 2-0 (16-11 Vertigo, 16-12 Eternal Fire).
In the play-offs match C9 faced Complexity. Being the absolute favourite of the match, Cloud9 failed to give CoL a fight and lost 0-2.
Cloud9's failures didn't end there. After getting into the net of the last chance of EPL Season 18, Cloud9 lost 1-2 to Liquid in a rather lacklustre manner, thus failing to qualify for the play-offs of the prestigious tournament. At the end of EPL S18, C9 finished in the top 20, which, to put it mildly, is weak for a top-tier team, which C9 was labelled as by literally everyone.
However, before the IEM Sydney IEM Long Convergence, C9 managed to rehabilitate themselves a bit for their mediocre performance at the last TOP tournaments. C9 won the BLAST Premier: Fall European Showdown 2023, earning them a slot at the BLAST Autumn Finals.
Before competing at Thunderpick World Championship 2023, Cloud9 made an appearance at IEM Sydney 2023. It wasn't great there, as C9 failed to make it past the group stage, crashing out after losing to Complexity.
Thunderpick World Championship 2023 was C9's first tournament with BoombI4 as captain officially. So far it's going well: they outplayed Fnatic and Vp in the group stage, and beat BIG 2-0 in the first play-offs match.
Cloud9 Mappool
The best C9 map is Vertigo. It has 2 wins in 3 matches.
Next is Inferno. On Inferno Cloud9 played 5 times, of which they won 3 matches.
Minus winrate on 4 maps at once: Ancient (42% wins in 7 matches), Overpass (33% wins in 3 matches), Anubis (3 matches, 33% wins), Mirage (2 matches, 0 wins).
History of head-to-head meetings
The last time the teams crossed paths on the professional stage was during IEM Dallas 2023. Then FaZe Clan celebrated the victory with the score 2-1.
Predicted result of FaZe vs C9 at Thunderpick World Championship 2023
In this match I expect a fight, but FaZe Clan will take the victory. Cloud9, who are going through a candy-bouquet period with a new captain, will try to hold the pace, but FaZe, as far as I am concerned, are a head above.
The result: FaZe's victory.