ESL UK Premiership: The Group Stage Week 2

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After a successful week last week, I thought we’d keep this going and keep the panel on their toes. It’s Week 2 of the UK Premiership hosted by ESL UK, after what was a delayed night last Monday, one does hope this week will run much more smoothly.

Last week saw some interesting results, as the UK Premiership has moved away from allowing draws in the league, it means that two of the four games went into Overtime. We also had a bit of controversy as Team uFrag managed to get a default win against Team XENEX due to two players who had issues with ESL Wire.

The best game of the week last week was probably United Estonia Vs AlterYourEgo, fluent end to end stuff and was incredibly unpredictable on who could see out the win. You could say Team CeX and how they forced overtime from a situation they were certainly likely to lose against Reason was a good game, but ultimately Team CeX were sloppy and proved incapable at picking up the win.

This week, you will see how the panelists fared from their predictions last week, and I’ll do the same each week onwards with a Mid-Season review too.

Week 1 Results

Team CeX 17:19 Reason Gaming
Team XENEX 0:1 Team uFrag
United Estonia 19:15 AlterYourEgo
Team Infused 5:16 The Working Men

Panel Week 1 Results

Duck – 75%
Emperor – 50%
Ash – 50%

The Guest of The Week gets stripped out of the panel, as it’s interesting to see how our actual panel do on a weekly basis. Duck went for Reason, the only one of the panel to do so last week, his only result that went against him, was the AYE-UE result, which Duck went for AYE. Luke suffered for going with Team CeX and AYE but did get TWM & uFrag correct. Meanwhile Ash also suffered the same fate as Luke, and opted for Team CeX and AYE, both of which of course lost their games.

The Teams

• AlterYourEgo – Immi, Esio, MightyMax, Peggyyyy, Quiver
• United Estonia (Reigning Champions) – HS, fetjz, Boaster, MCK, Joee
• Team Infused – redsnK, Dream, Roma, Jenko, Lumji
• Team XENEX – Gizmo, logaN, LIFELIKE, JPK, sHAW
• Team CeX – medic, CINDER, Charley, resu, Spandex
• Reason Gaming UK – keita, batham, conoR, miNi, REAZN
• The Working Men – jakem, dUdLeY, tsack, fre1, robiin
• Team uFrag – adamxoxo, HypeIzBack, Yoshi, Powell, xfp

The Panel

Michael “Duck” Moriarty – UKCSGO Journalist

Michael is one of our journalists here at UKCSGO.com, he has written for many different organisation websites including Team Acer, Ninjas in Pyjamas and Reason Gaming. His CS knowledge is relatively restricted to recent times as he has no prior knowledge or playtime in the UK Scene from either CS: Source or 1.6 and therefore his opinion should be treated as a relatively new to the scene.

Luke “EMPEROR” Ingram – Team exceL In Game Leader

Luke is one of the UK scene’s well known fringe players, he currently is playing for Team exceL who will be heading to epic.EIGHTEEN in June later this year. Luke has a rich history in the domestic Counter-Strike Scene, having started playing CS: Source, he has been around the block in many different communities including both Ministry Of Darkness and Rasta back in the day.

 

Ashley “ashhh” Battye – Former Team uFrag player

Ashley has often been on the fringes of the UK Scene, however made his official break out in last seasons UK Premiership with Team XENEX. He also featured in the Team uFrag lineup which courted headlines at epic.SEVENTEEN but then flopped massively at insomnia57. Nowadays, he can most likely be seen playing with the likes of long term friends Eddie “eddie” Dixon and Richard “Rhaz” Hazzard as they formed previous teams such as Team MINISTRY and often go to iSeries tournaments as a group of friends enjoying their dynamic style of CS. Ash can rifle incredibly well and is one of the few people who can frag well enough when calling.

Guest of The Week – Joe “JT” Talbot – Former UK Premiership Champion

Joe has been a long time player in the UK Scene, he won the first season of the re-branded EPS, UK Premiership back in May 2015 with the then Team XENEX with RattlesnK, Puls3, Sheekey, and mole. He played with Molotovs n Marshmallows for a while and nowadays he is riding solo as he’s taken a back seat to the UK Scene. This gives him ample knowledge on who could win some of these potential clashes this week in the UK Premiership.

 

Team XENEX Vs AlterYourEgo – 7pm

Michael “Duck” Moriarty

Assuming XENEX remember to update Wire and don’t default this week, they will be set for an absolute battering at the hands of European contenders AYE, who are looking to make a statement after losing a close fixture against United Estonia the previous week. Unless something goes badly wrong on the side of AYE, it should be a comfortable fixture for them.

Luke “EMPEROR” Ingram

Not sure of the details with what happened in the game last week that lead to a default being handed to ufrag however even without being able to see what xenex play/ed like this has to go towards AYE, AYE’s T side looked strong and even if the CT looks shaky there is more than enough about them to deal with xenex. Hand in hand with the collapse of last weeks game AYE will be wanting to make a swift amends and unfortunately for xenex they are in the firing line for this. I can’t see anything other than a comfotable victory for AYE 16:7.

Ashley “ashhh” Battye

Xenex didn’t play their game last week due to wire issues (or so I was told) and despite their unknown potential ‘advantage’ over AYE I still don’t think they will get over 5 rounds. Expect AYE to be ruthless here, and hopefully this game won’t set the tempo for the rest of the night!

AYE 16:3 Xenex

Joe “JT” Talbot

Can’t see xenex getting more than 5 rounds against AYE. After losing in overtime against United Estonia they will wanting to take 3 points out of this game. On any map i believe AYE will win 16:3.

Team CeX Vs The Working Men – 8pm

Michael “Duck” Moriarty

After having a dodgy performance last week against Reason, you’d have to hope that CeX would bounce back this time to try and perform well against the TWM mix. However, TWM had a blindingly good performance against Infused, a side made up of players from the previous NerdRage team (i.e. the non-Neil_M coached one), making them a force to be reckoned with. I’ll stick my foot out and say that The Working Men are gonna take it in a (hopefully) close fashion.

Luke “EMPEROR” Ingram

CeX didn’t impress me that much last week after I backed them to win, their was certainly individual moments that were positive but their was also plenty that cost them; this was a complete opposite to the working men although I did back them to win, i didn’t think they would win the game so convincingly. On what I have seen of both sides so far if The working men turn up like they did last week and players such as tsack and robin perform i just don’t see this being that close. I hope to eat my words for the sake of those watching and for CeX’s sake but i see this finishing 16 :8/9 in favour of the Working Men.

Ashley “ashhh” Battye

A poor loss last week for CeX and very surprising to see them hand over Dust2 to a mix based side. I called last week that if it went to D2 that it would be a coin flip, and for whatever reason (maybe the new roster not having time to go over new maps) they opted for it and lost in a close game that went to OT. TWM were the exact opposite and blew away their opponents in Infused on a map the recent Infused lineup seemed to enjoy playing. CeX in the past have had Dust2 as one of their stronger maps and I think they will be arrogant in some respects and leave it in, and there aren’t many situations that I really see TWM vetoing it unless the remaining maps end up something like D2, cache and cobble.
Charley v Dudley is the key matchup here as Dudley struggled at times last week in a game where the rest of his team were picking off Infused at will. I would expect CeX to try use this advantage in every way possible and despite having players like Tsack and Robin on their team I think the awp matchup is the key one here.

CeX to win a close game if this goes to d2/cache. TWM to win on cobble.

Joe “JT” Talbot

With the working men making infused look silly last week i can see they will do the same with CeX. Recent months haven’t been good to CeX with the amount of roster changes and key players departing from the iseries win. With the likes of robiin and tsack playing for TLM i cannot see CeX getting more than 10 rounds. My prediction for the game 16:7 to TLM

Team Infused Vs Reason Gaming – 9pm

Michael “Duck” Moriarty

This is a game that should show if Reason Gaming’s win last week was a fluke, or if they’re set to be proper contenders for the Pro League LAN at the end of the season. Before that, we’re set to see if they can beat an Infused side that would be feeling quite saw after their prevous game and looking to bounce back. However, the disparity of play between the two in their respective games is large… Reason should take it.

Luke “EMPEROR” Ingram

I went against Reason last week but I fancy this time around. Infused have already made a roster change and I am unsure again how much time they have had to play. Reason dispatched of CeX last week in overtime and if they can keep off the unorthodox maps then they should be able to come out on top. I feel this will be a close game with alot of back and forth rounds being traded. Reason showed last week that they could grind out rounds towards the end of the game and in overtime so would be interesting to see what they would be like with some kind of momentum. After speaking to some of the Infused guys in the aftermath of the game last week they will be wanting quickly put the loss last week into the back of their minds. I feel infused will need to start well to stand a chance here if not we could see dejavu of last week’s performance. I am going for a 16:13 win Reason.

Ashley “ashhh” Battye

I said last week that I thought this Infused lineup would start shaky due to a lack of experience, yet even with a sub their loss was an exceptionally poor one by which they were lucky to even take 4 rounds on their T side. This week they have made a big roster upgrade in my opinion by bringing back Lumji for Ozzy and in bringing him in they now have the player who topped almost every frag stat last season and I think this roster will be far stronger for the remained of this one. Reason had a great result v CeX last week but I think here we will see Infused pick up some speed and win this one fairly convincingly.

Infused should win 16:10.

Joe “JT” Talbot

This will probably be the most interesting game of the week. Infused will be wanting to bounce back after a heavy defeat to a mix. While Reason just scraped a win against a “new” CeX they will too be wanting to prove they have what it takes to make it to the EPS finals. Whoever gets the momentum at the start of this game will see it through to the end. Both teams have momentum players, if they fall behind early I doubt they will bounce back. I believe Reason will win 16:8.

United Estonia Vs Team uFrag – 10pm

Michael “Duck” Moriarty

Not a game that can easily be deciphered – but with players from both teams returning from a certain event in London over the weekend fatigue will potentially be a factor. However, the European firepower of the mix could most likely overpower uFrag and their tactical ability and allow the semi-Estonian side to take their second win. United Estonia should have it.

Luke “EMPEROR” Ingram

Where do i start with this one? ufrag didn’t even get to play last week but i don’t feel this will of hindered preparation for adam and co. I really feel the outcome of this game depends on what United Estonia turns first half or second half. ufrag have a decent map pool so whatever map it lands on I don’t feel they will be to concerned, I still feel UE will take this but I can see this going all the way and potentially overtime. 16:14 UE if i was to give a score for normal time

Ashley “ashhh” Battye

UE last week defeated my favourites for the number 1 spot with an OT win over AYE and I don’t really see a major contender to defeat them the way things went last week. uFrag in the past have struggled more against the mixes and this side is the biggest pug styled roster in the entire event. I’m still not sure uFrag have managed to replace their last awful 5th, but we all know how destructive this side can be if they get some momentum. I’m not entirely sure why Immi opted to play UE on a map like cache last week, but I don’t see Adam making the same mistake which is why I think this game will be a close one and arguably the game of the night.

UE 16:13 on a map like train/cobble/mirage.

Joe “JT” Talbot

This will be another interesting game, ufrag hasn’t played a game yet so they will hungry to show what a month or so has done after the 9th/12th finish at iseries! With the players in United Estonia they don’t have someone who will be able to be a leader type, they will be running around trying to win games with raw aim, uFrag will be prepared for this and i can’t see them beating a hungry team like uFrag who have so much to prove after a awful performance at iseries! 16:10 to ufrag

This concludes our predictions for Week Two in the UK Premiership, to follow the progress of all of these matches, then make sure you tune into the ESL UK Twitch Stream on this evening from 6:50pm, as each week will have all four matches going until 11pm.

We will have more coverage of the UK Premiership over the coming weeks, including statistical breakdowns of all the major players in the league, interviews, and more prediction articles on a weekly basis. Make sure you keep yourselves posted to UKCSGO.com as we continue to cover the top tier of UK Counter-Strike. You can follow us on Twitter and like our page on Facebook for further updates so you never miss a beat in the UK Scene.