The time has finally come for the Katowice Major to begin. Day 1 of the first stage is starting on the 13th, which means there’s a whole slate of games that need to be picked apart for any and every advantage.
For the Major, I’ll be starting with a hypothetical $1000, and I’ll be making picks each day. All the odds below are from betway, although we have several recommended sites below if you’d like to shop around.
I have Vitality earmarked as one of the favorites in this stage. They have one of the best players in the stage, maybe even the tournament. They stormed through the European qualifier, dropping a series to North and maps to North and Valiance. In their first-round matchup, they’re up against TyLoo, the only returning challenger from the Asian Minor.
TyLoo’s recent matches (although they’re all from last year, due to the player break), are a little all over the place. They have wins over Renegades and BIG, along with a smorgasbord of Asian and CIS teams that no one has ever heard of. Their loss column includes Heroic, HellRaisers, BIG, and Sharks. Not a super encouraging list.
The reason I’m taking TyLoo on this is for one, the odds are pretty good. I like TyLoo at +220, I think there’s value there. For two, I don’t think Vitality is going to hit the ground running. ZywOo is one of the youngest players at the Major, and he is really the only player on the team that’s been playing at a tier one level. If he falters, even for just a round or two, that could be enough for TyLoo to pull away in this best-of-one.
TyLoo has a long history of being a dangerous upset team, most notably knocking SK into the loser’s bracket at IEM Sydney in 2018. I’m expecting Vitality will be caught by surprise, and with their already shaky roster construction, I could see them crumbling.
Bet: Tyloo – $100 to win $220
I really am not a fan of G2. They’re coming into this event with a fairly new roster, I don’t trust shox’s in-game-leading, and kennyS hasn’t looked like kennyS in a long time.
Vega, on the other hand, are coming into this event looking good. They lost a close best-of-three to Vitality going 2-0 in December, but they had at least 13 rounds both maps. They took two maps off of ENCE in October of last year, and had a series win over NRG at the same event.
Vega at +140 is solid value, especially for a team that has a history of overperforming at Majors. They always seem to take a step up at these events somehow, so I like them over G2.
Bet: Vega – $100 to win $240
Or, if you do like G2’s chances, I recommend G2 & over 26.5 rounds (+175). If G2 manages to take the best-of-one, which they might with their firepower and pedigree, I doubt they’ll be able to hold Vega to under 11 rounds. While I do like this bet, I’m going to stick with Vega.
The last bet I’ve got for you is, for my money, one of the better values in the first round. Do you know the last time NiP won a map? November 24th, they took one map off Astralis at the ECS Season 6 Finals. The last time they won a series was a 2-0 over North, at the same event, 2 days earlier. NiP do not have the results to justify being a -250 favorite.
Since the last time NiP won a series, we’ve seen Furia dominate the Americas Minor, dropping just one series to NRG, with both maps running relatively close. KSCERATO and yuurih were two of the best six players in attendance, and they looked hungry. They’re likely to come out of the gate fast and blitz NiP, who I would imagine haven’t prepared all that well for Furia. (Not for any fault of their own though I would imagine. There isn’t a ton of tape of Furia against top tier competition, and I wouldn’t blame NiP for underestimating these guys.)
Bet: NiP – $150 to win $262.50
Every round, I’ll try and present you guys with a parlay that I like, starting with two of the heaviest favorites
Parlaying ENCE and NRG together here gets you +172, which I really like. Both of these results are pretty sure things, ENCE and NRG are two of the most complete teams here, and they each have one of the five best players at the event. I probably feel better about ENCE than I do about NRG, just because I think Winstrike has the potential to be a little friskier in a best-of-one.
Since I do feel so good about ENCE, I have another parlay to drop on you, as a special treat.
Bet: ENCE win & under 26.5 rounds
This brings the odds up to +294, which I think has really good value. ENCE should have little trouble cleaning up Spirit, and I like NRG a lot. The only thing to be cautious of here is, there’s always a CIS team that overperforms at the Major. So, if you want to play it safe, I’d recommend the other parlay. I’ll be putting my money down on this one though.
Bet: NRG – $100 to win $294
In total, I’m putting up $450 to win $1016. I think tomorrow’s slate of games will be a little more fun, although there were some gems in round one. I’ll be back tomorrow to recap how I did and give you my picks for round 2. Happy betting!
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