ESL UK Premiership Promotions Run Down

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With ESL UK Premiership qualifiers now all over, it’s time to look at the eight teams that will be participating in the Promotions Tournament, which determines which four teams make the group stages to join United Estonia, Team Infused, Team XENEX & AlterYourEgo.

In the next few weeks, the group stages will kick off but first we are the most important stage of the qualifiers, Promotions Tournament. The biggest part of the Promotions Tournament is the fact that the four teams that make it will guarantee them some form of coverage and if any of the developing teams such as Perfect 5/7 were looking for an organisation to take them to the next level, this could be the door and window that opens to give them that opportunity.

Over the last three weeks we have seen a massive set of upsets in the qualification cups. The biggest of all coming in the form of The Working Men (formerly Team Sex) who won the first and second cups and made the Semi-Finals of the third cup which gave them 250 points to finish top of the qualification pack. The other big surprise was that Craig “onscreen” Shannon had entered a mix team of sorts with players such as Sam “RattlesnK” Gawn, Pete “pt” Wright, & former Team EnVyUs star Fabien “kioShiMa” Fiey. Teams that were expected to finish inside the Top 5 ended up doing so, which included Molotovs n Marshmallows.

The other big surprise package was the fact that Nikolay “NipXe” Zhelev and his band of merry men, Perfect 5/7 made a rather deep run in the final cup which earned them a second placed finish after finally losing to Molotovs n Marshmallows . Their deep run in Cup 3 managed to make them accrue more points than uFrag, despite the fact that Perfect 5/7 had bombed out at the Ro64 stage in Cup 1. They ended with points of 115 over Team uFrag’s points of 100 after the three cups.

Other notable absentees were Jake “Jakem” McCausland’s mix team The Working Men, Monumentalis, Enraged eSports, Girls Generation, G-Pros and potential hopefuls, who had consistently been upsetting a few people, Charlie “K1NDEADLY” Weber’s mix team called k1ds of Steam.

With all the roster shuffles in the aftermath of insomnia57, it will be interesting to see how all these teams fare this weekend, with only Molotovs n Marshmallows avoiding the curse of the UK Scene shuffle chop shop.

Here are the teams taking part in the Promotions Tournament on April 9th – 10th.

• Rasta.Xd
• Team CeX
• fish123
• The Working Men (formerly Team Sex)
• Stream Sniped (formerly Team lol)
• Molotovs n Marshmallows
• Perfect 5/7
• Team uFrag

Rasta.Xd

AndrewIsGod, Req, Bensmither, L1mpz, toxiN

Recent Achievements to Date:

• None

Participation in Other Leagues:

• ESEA Season 21 Open League – 15 Wins 1 Loss
• ESEA Season 21 Open League Playoffs – 1 loss

Rasta.Xd are probably one of the weirdest line ups here to date. They assume Good Looking Gamers previous spot in the last season, due to GLG finally seeing the end of the tunnel. The old members of Thomas “Req” Llewelyn-Evans & Arveer “L1mpz” Buray (as back up) have gone onto form a new team from the ashes and joined the organisation of Rasta as a result to give the Rasta.Xd a name. They have a mixture of new talents to the scene (here in the UK). They managed to pick up the services of Thomas “ToxiN” Flauto & Sacha “Bensmither” Benattar who have played for teams such as AWAKE & EnRo Griffins in Europe.

After speaking to Llewelyn-Evans, I discovered they had initially bumped into these two players, and since then have really gelled well together. They are also regularly practicing currently, and play most nights (whatever that means in the UK). However the other night after a loss in the playoffs in ESEA, they suffered some serious setbacks, as the team imploded which resulted in Mark “maarc” Hammond leaving and nearly everyone crumbling.

The old tales of Good Looking Gamers was that they would often play well in patches, and it was incredibly difficult to predict where this team would place, due to their inconsistent nature. Last year I expected them to not even make it through the Promotions Tournament into the group stages, however they did. The issue here is, I do feel there is far too much talent in this tournament that could and should beat these guys. Rasta could surprise though and that is one thing going for them, because they hardly LAN and they hardly play vs UK teams, it’s difficult for other teams to judge the capability of this team. It’s also difficult for me to judge how they will fare, but I just feel some of the more talented teams in here and some of the lineups could end up just ending the challenge of Rasta.

Prediction: Won’t make it.

Team CeX

spandex, CINDER, resu, Charley, medic

Recent Achievements to Date:

• insomnia56 (December 2015) – 1st Place
• epic.SEVENTEEN (February 2016) – 4th Place
• insomnia57 (March 2016) – 9th – 12th

Participation in Other Leagues:

• ESEA Season 21 Main League – 8 Wins 8 Losses

Well this lineup has been through the ringer recently. In the run up to insomnia57, it was replacing Scott “kARMApangya” Campbell & James “Fisher” Fisher on the team, and upgrading their talent on the team. Since insomnia57, it’s been about swapping the two new stars they drafted in for two stand ins for the time being for the upcoming Promotions Tournament and hopefully guaranteeing a spot in the group stages of the UK Premiership.

This makes any kind of prediction incredibly difficult because we already know what the core three are capable of but as ever, CS:GO is a team game, and teams usually have set strategies to outdo their opponents that they face. They have a lineup now that looks incredibly unique, I’m unsure whether the five they have submitted will be permanent players in the lineup or whether they are just stand ins here for Promotions. However,  both Kieran “medic” Williams & Laurence “spandex” Webber have an experience in CS Source, when they played for the famous XPLICIT lineup that were disqualified at insomnia39 due to an illegal bind in one of the players configs. Both players have vast experience in CS, so will bring that to Team CeX in the short term. Both players had a stint under the organisation TLR, so their CS:GO knowledge should be up there for what the team currently needs.

For me, this team looks good on paper, however depending on the opponents they face this weekend, we should in theory see these guys get to the group stages and keep their spot in the UK Premiership, but they really need the help from the man upstairs to navigate a path that would help them. It will be tough, but I’m sure there is possibility.

Prediction: Slim chance – Into Group Stages

fish123

keita, batham, REAZN, conoR, mini

Recent Achievements to Date:

• None

Participation in Other Leagues:

• None

The fish123 mix team is one people should recognise, with the established leader of Jamie “Keita” Hall who was formerly of CAZ eSports. This team has been cobbled together for the Promotions Tournament in the hopes of retaining their place in the UK Premiership. They were on the brink of playoffs last season, but had to face the then Choke Gaming roster in a Best-Of-Three to decide who would make the playoffs.

It will be interesting to see how this team really fares in the Promotions Tournament, but without any online results to go on, without any LAN results to base my predictions on, I just don’t see this iteration of the fish123 name making it back into the group stages. If (and I mean a really big if) they get a favorable draw this weekend, there could be a possibility. However all of their star players in this lineup really need to be on form and in the game, and as they are a mix team, that could be something in their favour.

Prediction: Won’t make it.

The Working Men

dUdLeY, fisher, jakem, mole, fre1

Recent Achievements to Date:

• ESL UK Premiership Qualifier #1 (March 2016) – 1st Place
• ESL UK Premiership Qualifier #2 (March 2016) – 1st Place

Participation in Other Leagues:

• None

Since the first two qualifiers, this team really fell apart, they stunned everyone (including nerdRage at the time), in winning the first cup. They were the “surprise package” that no one really saw coming. The ironic one for now, is on route to the final they had beaten Jake “jakem” McCausland’s mix team The Working Men at the time, they then went on to play the team who had beaten uFrag earlier, Enraged eSports in the Semi-Finals and had beaten them. Finally in the final, they beat James “redsnK” Littlewood’s nerdRage in a Best-Of-Three.

Just after the Cup three defeat, they had completely fell apart for whatever reason, which was incredibly strange due to them already having secured qualification, they lost Tramaine “xfp” Stanley to Team uFrag, whilst Tom “Jenko” Jenkinson has since gone on to join the unannounced Team Infused roster.

It seems that Dudley “dUdLeY” Morris has now gone to recruit Jake “jakem” McCausland and Josh “mole” Rowley along with the incredibly talented Robin “Robiin” Sjogren as the backup. On paper, this team looks like the real deal, and certainly should be aiming to get in the group stages. This is now especially the case with both Josh & Robin on their roster, as both of these players are probably the most incredible talents around in our scene.

However this team should in theory make it to the group stages, although as I have noted below, it will be on “slim chances”.

Prediction: Slim Chance – Possible Group Stages

Turn to Page 2 for the other four participating teams and what is the run down on all of the remaining teams.