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We're continuing our look at what's happening at BLAST Premier: Fall Groups 2024. We're talking about the group stage, specifically Quartet B.
Among the contenders for the play-offs and then for the main prize of $425,000 and a trip to the World Final 2024 are Place Spirit and Liquid. The teams will start their journey through the tournament with a face-to-face meeting in Group B.
We're trying to figure out how the Liquid vs Spirit match will end and who will come out on top of the winner of the Vitality vs Astralis pairing.
Let's go.
Spirit Form
Let's open the match with an analysis of Spirit's form. In this match they will play as favourites with odds to win at around 1.4.
The 2023 season has been a busy one for Spirit. The Serbian club has played wherever they can, but they have not managed to get any significant results.
They started the previous season with an appearance at IEM Master Katowice 2023, where they finished in the top 12. Then there was the local CCT Central Europe Malta Finals 2023, where they finished in the top 6.
One of the biggest tournaments of the 2023 season for Spirit was ESL Pro League Season 17, where the Dragons finished in TOP-28. They tried to make it to the Major in Paris, but again all in vain.
From the middle and up to the end of the year Spirit played at local events of small calibre. And they were quite successful, it is worth mentioning: TOP-1 at CCT North Europe Series #6, TOP-2 at CCT Online Finals #2, victory at Dunav Party LAN and Thunderpick World Championship 2023: European Series #2.
- Team Spirit roster: chopper, zont1x, sh1ro, donk, magixx
At the end of the year they won the BB Dacha. In 2024, BLAST Premier: Spring Showdown 2024 was the first major event for the Dragons. Spirit played frankly poorly there: they finished in the top 16 at their debut BLAST Championship, advancing to the Spring Showdown.
At IEM Katowice 2024 Spirit started their performance at the Play-In stage. There they beat Apeks 13-0 without a chance, and then confidently (except for 2 maps) beat MongolZ 2-0, thus qualifying for the group stage. The group stage was not a problem for Spirit either: after giving up only 1 map to NaVi, they easily made it to the play-offs by beating CoL and FaZe Clan 2-0. The IEM Katowice 2024 play-offs confirmed Spirit's dominance, as they easily shut down Falcons (2-0) and it was even easier against FaZe in the grand finals (3-0).
After the triumph at Katowice 2024, Spirit made it to PGL CS2 Copenhagen Major 2024, where they managed to reach the play-offs, but Ledge and FaZe Clan in the first round of the main stage. In doing so, Spirit finished in the top 8.
Spirit had a kind of successful performance at BB Dacha, but a 0-3 loss to MOUZ in the grand finals spoilt things a bit.
At IEM Dallas 2024 Team Spirit had a very easy time in the group stage, not giving up a single map in the B basket. However, they didn't manage to beat everyone in the play-offs: Vitality intervened at the TOP-4 stage and knocked Spirit out of the tournament.
Later Spirit won the BLAST Premier: Spring Final 2024. And then came a string of poor performances, including Top 8 and Top 16 at Intel Extreme Masters Cologne 2024.
ESL Pro League Season 20 Team Spirit started with Group B, where they defeated Ledge and MIBR in the second round of the upper grid and after dropping below, they had no trouble beating The MongolZ and 3DMAX, which gave them a pass to the play-offs, where they beat FURIA 2-0 in their first match. Later they ran into NaVi, after their defeat they finished the pro league.
Team Spirit Mapple
The best map of Team Spirit is Vertigo, where the Brazilians played 5 times and won in 3 maps. Next comes Mirage, already with 7 games and 4-3 statistics.
The neutral choice for Team Spirit will be Nuke and Ancient. The Brazilians have 6 maps there and the score is 3-3 on each.
The worst is Overpass (2-3) and Inferno (1-2).
Team Liquid's form
We continue the Liquid vs Spirit match with an analysis of Liquid's form. In this match they are playing as an outsider with odds to win at around 3.
The American club had a pretty productive 2023 season. Played in a lot of tournaments, but high results were a rarity.
They started the year with a top-4 finish at IEM Katowice 2023, where they reached the top 4. Next was the equally good BLAST Premier: Spring American Showdown with a similar top-4, and then BLAST.tv Paris Major 2023: American RMR followed by a top-3 and a trip to the main tournament of the year.
Unfortunately for Liquid, that's where their results ended. At BLAST.tv Paris Major 2023, the team made it to the top 8 and that was their biggest achievement of the year.
After making it to the legends stage at the only Major tournament of the season, Liquid played at a lot of big events. These included IEM Dallas 2023 with a top-12 ranking, BLAST Premier: Fall Groups 2023 with a top-9 ranking, and IEM Master Cologne with a top-12 ranking.
At the end of the season they played at Gamers8 2023, finishing in the top 16 and ESL Pro League Season 18, finishing in the top 20. Closed the year with a second place finish at BLAST Premier: Fall American Showdown 2023.
- Team Liquid roster: NAF, YEKINDAR, jks, ultimate, Twistzz.
A string of failures at major championships has caused major roster changes. Such that Liquid in 2024 can be called "Dream Team", but the status still has to be earned.
2024 began with qualifiers for the American RMR. They came out, which is not surprising. They also tried to qualify for IEM Chengdu 2024, but it was not successful: in the final of the qualifiers Ledge and M80.
Liquid took TOP-8 at BLAST Premier: Spring Groups 2024, and then passed at IEM Dallas 2024, did not pass at PGL Copenhagen Major 2024, taking TOP-8 at home, and then TOP-16 at BLAST Premier: Spring Showdown 2024 and TOP-6 at IEM Masters and TOP-6 Chengdu 2024. They also played at ESL Pro League Season 19, where they finished Top-8.
IEM Dallas 2024 Liquid started with a victory over CoL, but then - a completely unexpected defeat by 9z Team in the match for the play-offs. As a result, at IEM Dallas 2024 Liquid finished in the top 9-12 without making the play-offs.
Liquid attended BLAST Premier: Fall Groups 2024, where they surprised everyone. At BLAST Premier: Fall Groups 2024, Liquid finished in the top 1-4, winning their group, thus securing a slot at BLAST Premier: World Final.
Liquid Long Sogpeg IEM Cologne 2024 from the Play-In stage, where they played twice against Brazilian representatives: paiN and FURIA and won both times to advance to the group stage. At the Long Stage of the group stage IEM Cologne 2024 played against FaZe, where Ledgeili 0-2. After falling to the bottom of the group stage, Liquid made it to the small final, where they again played against FaZe and in a very dramatic match they lost 1-2 and as a result finished in the top 8.
ESL Pro League Season 20 Team Liquid started with a performance in Group D, where they beat ENCE and Vp 2-0, and lost to Vitality 1-2 in the play-offs seeding match. Starting the main stage of the ESL Pro League Season 20 play-offs with a match against CoL, Liquid beat the American club 2-0 without a chance. But then they faced G2 and as a result of the meeting they left ESL Pro League S20.
Team Liquid Mapple
Team Liquid's top 1 map for the last 3 months is Mirage. Liquid has a mind-blowing winrate of 92% with 13 games played.
They also played on Inferno, where they won 5 matches out of 7 games. Nuke is also in plus winrate, where the "ninjas" have 3 wins from 5 matches.
The most not favoured map for Team Liquid will be Vertigo. There they have 6 maps and only 1 win.
History of head-to-head meetings between Liquid and Spirit
Liquid and Spirit played each other at BLAST Premier: Spring Groups 2024, where Liquid won.
Predicted result of Spirit - Liquid at BLAST Premier: Fall Final 2024
In this match, my bet is on Liquid. Nominally, they are weaker, but I like them better than Spirit in their last matches at ESL Pro League S20. Liquid have beaten Spirit at BLAST in the past, and they will repeat that success now.
Bottom line: Liquid wins.
