Welcome to EGamersWorld.
The group stage matches of ESL Pro League Season 19 continue. We are talking about Group C matches, where the fate of 2 more slots for the play-offs of the tournament is being decided.
However, not everything is so fast, because the teams still have to play and play before reaching the play-offs. This includes GamerLegion - forZe.
Let's try to find out who will be stronger in this match and who will make it to the next round of the "middle grid".
Let's go.
GamerLegion form
Let's open the match analysis with GL's form. In this match, the European club plays the first number one with odds to win at around 1.6.
After the triumphant Paris Major a GamerLegion gave up in terms of performance. However, they are not weak, otherwise they would look much worse at major tournaments than they do now.
In 2023, GamerLegion didn't show much promise. They played well at local events like Thunderpick Bitcoin Series #2 where they won, CCT West Europe Series #1 where they finished top 2, RES Western European Masters: Spring 2023 where they finished top 2 again.
There was also TOP-1 at Elisa Invitational Winter 2023, but the main achievement happened in May this year. It was then that GamerLegion defied logic and made it to the grand final of BLAST.tv Paris Major 2023, where they defeated the hosts of the tournament - Vitality.
- GamerLegion lineup: acoR, Snax, Keoz, isak, volt.
After a great injury in Paris, GamerLegion lost two of their headliners - siuhy and iM. Newcomers neaLaN and volt are not yet reaching the level of Top 2 Major a, and their KDs are eloquent: 0.64 for the former and 0.78 for the latter.
The first match at IEM Cologne 2023 was against Monte. The Ukrainian club was head to head and shut down their vis-a-vis with a score of 2-0 (16-8 Mirage, 16-11 Overpass).
GamerLegion managed to switch on at the last moment. In the match against TheMongolZ, on the first map GL Ledge were 8-16 up on Mirage, but cameback Inferno (16-8), and closed the series on the dopes with Overpass (19-15).
The International was even more interesting against fnatic. On the first map Vertigo GL lost with the score 5-16, but on Inferno GamerLegion played 16-12, and on Ancient they closed the dopes with the score 19-17.
As a result, IEM Cologne 2023 ended with GL in 8th place. They were knocked out by Cloud9, but the result is a good one considering the lineup change.
At Gamers8 Long Sogpeg were matched against Apeks, the other opener of the Paris Major. Both maps gave GL a serious headache, but after dopes on Mirage and a close fight on Overpass GL made it to the next round. However, that's where GL's G8 journey ended at the Top 8, when they lost to Heroic 1-2.
GamerLegion later attended ESL Pro League Season 18 and IEM Sydney 2023. Both tournaments didn't go well: top-20 at EPL, top-8 at IEM Sydney.
ESL Challenger Jonkoping 2023 GL is going pretty well. First Ledge beat MIBR 9-13, and then beat 3DMAX 2-1 in the match for life. With a race left, GL made it to the top 6, but there Ledgeili Vp.
Towards the end of the year Gamer Legion played at Elisa Masters Espoo 2023, where they reached the top 6, BB Dacha (top 8) and ESL Challenger at DreamHack Atlanta. Top 8 there again.
There were two big tournaments in the 2024 season before RMR's Long Sogpeg - BLAST Premier: Spring Groups 2024 and IEM Katowice 2024. Both GL championships finished in the top 12, which I would call a pretty good result.
At PGL Major Copenhagen 2024: European RMR B GL Long Sogpeg started with a no-hitter against VItality (3-13) before beating Pera (13-6) and losing to ENCE (14-16) on dps. Later Ledgealy and Heroic, as well as 9Pandas in the Decider match, after which they were unable to go to the Major.
However, they ended up in Copenhagen, because 9Pandas couldn't get visas for travelling to Denmark. GamerLegion looked good in Copenhagen, but it was not enough to pass to the Elimination Stage, and GL's way at the first ever Major tournament on Counter-Strike ended on 17-19th line.
At the ESL Pro League Season 19 Long Sogpeg, GL Long Sogpeg started with a solid 2-0 win over ENCE. In the play-offs match against MOUZ GL played only 1 map and failed to win here: 0-2 and fell into the "middle" net.
Mapple GamerLegion
The best map GL is Overpass. The team has 6 wins and 2 losses there.
There was also Ancient with 2 wins and 1 loss. Still have Mirage in the pool (57% wins in 7 matches).
On Inferno they are 2-2. Nuke has 1 try and a loss.
Not playing on Anubis and Vertigo.
Form forZe
We continue the match analysis with an analysis of forZe's form. In this match they are playing as a number two with the odds of winning at around 2.
ForZe are ranked 59th in the world ranking. This position was influenced by a rather poor performance during the season, but ForZe had some good performances.
They started the season with a top-3 finish at ESL Pro League Season 17: European Conference, after which they suffered a series of failures: top-8 at CCT North Europe Series #3, CCT Central Europe Malta Finals and CCT West Europe Series #1.
In March of this year, they made an appearance at the ESL Pro League Season 17. There we managed to get into the play-offs and squeeze the map from FaZe, which is already worthy of praise.
In May they took the top 6 at BLAST.tv Paris Major 2032: European RMR B, which eventually allowed them to qualify for BLAST.tv Paris Major 2023. At the only World Championship of the season, ForZe finished Top 19.
A series of successful events followed. Top-4 at BB Playlist Freedom and ESL Challenger Katowice 2023, as well as a win at CCT Online Finals #1.
- ForZe roster: shalfey, tN1R, SELLTER, NickelBack, smooya.
Before the ESL Challenger League Season 46 ForZe played local tournaments, but this time without much success. We can mention only the top 3 at ESEA Cash Cup: Europe - Autumn 2023, and the last tournament just before the Challenger League, Forze failed: they took the top 16 at CCT East Europe Series #3.
At ESL Challenger Season 46, they did pretty well in the group stage. First, they finished top-3 in Basket A, and then made it to the so-called Mid Group in the next stage. In Mid Group Forze defeated Movistar Riders and Saw, but lost to EYEBALLERS in the final match of the "middle basket", which, however, did not affect the seeding in the future. At the end of ESL Challenger #46 forZe advanced to the grand finals, where they lost to 3DMAX by a score of 0-3.
In 2024, ForZe had a lot of qualification tournaments, but did not succeed anywhere: they failed at the qualifiers for IEM Dallas, IEM China, PGL Major Copenhagen. The only full-fledged tournament was the Skyesports Masters 2023, where ForZe finished in the top 6.
In the first round of ESL Pro League Season 19 forZe played against MONTE. They lost with the score 0-2. In the next match they played against FURIA and actually showed a very good performance, shutting down the more titled opponent with a score of 2-0.
ForZe Mappool
The best map Forze has played in 3 months is Inferno. The team played there 5 times with a winrate of 60 per cent.
On Mirage, Ancient. Nuker, Overpass and Anubis NaVi has 50% wins. On Ancient and Nuke the team played 4 matches each, on the others - 2.
Vertigo is not playing.
History of head-to-head meetings GamerLegion - forZe
Over the last year the teams have played each other only 1 time, on BLAST Paris Major Challenger Stage and then GL won cleanly.
Predicted result of forZe - GL at ESL Pro League Season 19
In this match I expect a close game. As for me, the clubs will not separate with a clean win in either direction.
Bottom line: total +2.5.
