After only picking them up just shy of 2 months ago, Team XENEX are parting ways with their roster.
Picked up in January the team have had a turbulent road which has seen them fail to qualify for the ESL Premiership and have got off to a slow start in the current season of ESEA Main, going 2-7 so far.
After a first week full of action and surprise, we turn our attentions to the second week of Multiplay’s UK Masters League. The league is formed of eight teams who play each other over three week days and play in a Best-Of-Two series. The league has £15,000 up for grabs and will see two teams head to Multiplay’s insomnia series to compete in a Best-Of-Five Finals on the Friday of the event.
Week one’s action saw some surprising results from the fm-eSports camp. Despite our panelist predictions being spot on for the fm/exceL match up, fm-eSports ended up going up against a resiliant SKUM Gaming the following day. The interesting thing to note though, was that fm’s map win against exceL was on the same map they played SKUM and lost. Both of those maps went to overtime too as well. With that said, fm-eSports do come away with two draws in the two series they have played, and thus haven’t really been beaten yet. The more surprising of results came from Endpoint who managed to win against SKUM but then lose against the talented lineup of fish123. It did mar their results in Week 1 somewhat, and leaves fish123 as the early leaders in the league thus far.
fm-eSports first week results don’t give the greatest of confidence (Source: Multiplay Flickr)
fm-eSports: nEiLZiNHo, weber, fre1, Puls3, stan1ey
Team Endpoint: Immi, Esio, MightyMax, Luzuh, HudzG
Team CeX: resu, BrodyC, LS, Astroo, JDD
(ex) SKUM Gaming: NK, FiLLeR, DUKK, Hawkins, MMuffin
Imperial: Jakem, conoR, Whindanski, Boaster, REAZN
fish123: keita, Sliggy, robiin, batham, tsack
Team Infused: SHEEKEY, shaney , Lumji , Ozzy , Snakey
exceL eSports: Jenko, Mole, Kryptix, Smooya, Jesp
Imperial 2:0 Team CeX (16:12 de_nuke & 16:13 de_train)
Team Endpoint 2:0 SKUM Gaming (16:12 de_cbble & 16:5 de_overpass)
Team Infused 0:2 fish123 (16:19 de_cbble & 12:16 de_inferno)
fm-eSports 1:1 exceL eSports (10:16 de_cache & 19:16 de_mirage)
fm-eSports 1:1 SKUM Gaming (16:19 de_mirage & 16:13 de_cbble)
Team Endpoint 0:2 fish123 (10:16 de_overpass & 6:16 de_inferno)
Michael “Duck” Moriarty – UKCSGO JournalistMichael is one of our journalists here at UKCSGO, he has written for many different organisation websites including Team Acer, Ninjas in Pyjamas and Reason Gaming. He currently writes for ESL with some IEM posts he has done over the last few months. 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. However he is starting to build on his awareness of the UK Scene in CS:GO and has valid ideas of what teams should be doing what. Michael will be taking on Tuesday night matches in UK Masters.
Ryan is one of the UK’s leading stars when it comes to commentating. Having started at epic.LAN last year for epic.SEVENTEEN, as an admin, he ended up going to Dreamhack Summer last June on behalf of CAZ eSports, then shortly after that he dived into casting, and got to cast events such as UK Premiership, UK Masters, Starladder, and WESG. He has an in depth knowledge around the UK Esports scene, and continues to thrive on casting events. Ryan will be taking on Wednesday night matches in UK Masters.
Callum has been working himself through the ranks over the last year, having won epic.NINETEEN back in October last year, he has the insight to help the panel come to some better conclusions on what should happen in the matches from week to week. Callum currently plays for Chrome Gaming who narrowly missed out in UK Masters and didn’t quite make it to the ESL Premiership either, but he knows how competitive the scene really is. Callum will be taking on Thursday night matches in UK Masters.
Imperial Vs Team CeX – Prediction: 1:1 Actual: 2:0
Team Endpoint Vs SKUM Gaming – Prediction: 2:0 Actual: 2:0
Result: 1/2 (50%)
Infused Vs fish123 – Prediction: 0:2 Actual: 0:2
fm-eSports Vs exceL eSports – Prediction: 1:1 Actual: 1:1
Result: 2/2 (100%)
fm-eSports Vs SKUM Gaming – Prediction: 2:0 Actual: 1:1
Team Endpoint Vs fish123 – Prediction: 1:1 Actual: 0:2
Result: 0/2 (0%)
Fish are bouyant once again after qualifying for ESL Premiership Finals, even if it was after a loss to FM. After taking two wins in last week’s games they’re looking to be near the top of this league as well. CeX haven’t been able to impress as much as they did at epic. With fish123 showing a lot of skill coming into this week, and CeX not really hitting their groove still, there’s a lot of work to go on that night.
Prediction: 2:0 fish123 (Two close games, however)
A battle of two (sorta) unknowns. With both teams going close against other sides last week, this’ll be the match-up that decides the mid-table scrap. Infused are looking to keep strong and return to the heights of CS that both the org and the players once knew. ex-SKUM are now trying to reclaim their names and show they mean business. With these two sides both looking to perform strong, it’ll be a close head to head.
Prediction: A close series on our hands here, so 1:1
Imperial showed us last week that they can be a side that can be reckoned with in this league, despite only playing once last week, they managed to navigate past a side who came off the back of a second placed finish at the first LAN event of the year, and that has to be saying something. SKUM meanwhile disappointed us against Endpoint, but showed what they were capable of by taking a map off current champions fm-eSports. I think Imperial should take it 2-0, providing we don’t see any of that magic spark from SKUM that gets them flying high with some crazy talent.
Prediction: Imperial win 2:0
This will be an incredibly close match series, with both sides looking to prove a point. Despite Team Endpoint’s recent changes in roster, they certainly are capable of putting a shift in against an exceL side which struggled yesterday evening against a team they should have simply beaten. I’d like to see Endpoint win over Excel as they seem to be self imploding currently. However it really depends on maps and who steps up on either side, a 1:1 could be likely or a close 2:0 either way. Should be a good match to watch though!
Prediction: Tough to call, but 1:1 on maps (or close 2:0 either way)
Team Endpoint will be looking for answers this week. Tough matches ahead (Source: Multiplay Flickr)
I predict 1-1 for Endpoint v CeX – When CeX are turning up and hitting their shots they look very strong so I feel as if they’ll be able to catch Endpoint off and get a point, also Endpoint are currently going through roster changes which I feel will effect their performance as they won’t be fully focused / motivated. I think the scorelines are going to be really close on both maps however and any team can easily take the 2-0 depending on who turns up.
Prediction: Close match here, but 1:1 on maps (or 2:0 either way)
I predict this to go 1-1, however I believe fm-eSports could easily take the 2-0 if they’re performing well. I can’t imagine fm losing 2-0 however Fish123 do have very strong players who can easily turn up and cause upset purely with their skill if fm weren’t playing well. I’ve seen fm-eSports playing very sick recently and they have the edge as they’re a team who have been practising together for some time where as fish123 are still a mix so a 2-0 fm could be likely.
Prediction: Another close match here, 1:1 on maps.
We will have more coverage of the UK Masters 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 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.
It is the brand new league season of UK Masters, so as I kind of missed the boat for both UKGT & ESL UK Premiership, we are going to do our famous prediction articles for UK Masters. Multiplay introduced UK Masters early last year, and it became that successful that they saw incredible potential to do more with it. They introduced the Best-Of-Two league stage with money up for grabs each time someone wins.
We are now onto the third season, aptly named Spring Season 2017, and with £15,000 up for grabs it will surely be an intense league season. Marred in some controversy in the qualifiers, we have finally arrived at the correct number of teams for the league season. Eight teams, mostly from the top end of the scene, however we do a few newer teams and people within this group this time. SKUM Gaming who have been marred in all kinds of controversy are included within the league. Nika “NK” Khaburzania is the man caught in the cross-hairs of the entire scene as everyone has been watching his performances since he dropped a 60 bomb in a match against exceL eSports (that went to many overtimes). So much so, that people stood there watching NK at LAN and even got into his face too at LAN. Many people have their own reserved judgement and have been vocal about it, however he continues to plough on and take the shit thrown at him.
Back in the Quickscope days, I used to write “prediction articles” on the EDCSSL league seasons, and assembled panel’s of people to help predict outcomes each week. This is basically what this article aims to do, although the turn-around time between epic.LAN & the new season, has been one of a short space of time, so if panellist’s are rusty, then that is probably why. This season will be incredibly interesting, with the LAN Finals at insomnia60 on Easter Weekend in April, then we are not sure who will make it there. However, first up it is the online stage which we will be guiding you through, all the way through the season, our panel will predict each week’s results. Because leagues have moved away from Best Of One, it means we will have to change the way we do predictions, so each week, I will assign a day of matches to each panellist and they will then take ownership of those days of matches.
UK Masters Trophy
fm-eSports: nEiLZiNHo, weber, fre1, Puls3, stan1ey
Team Endpoint: Immi, Esio, MightyMax, Luzuh, HudzG
Team CeX: resu, BrodyC, LS, Astroo, JDD
SKUM Gaming: NK, FiLLeR, DUKK, Hawkins, MMuffin
Imperial: Jakem, conoR, Whindanski, Boaster, REAZN
fish123: keita, Sliggy, robiin, batham, tsack
Team Infused: SHEEKEY, shaney , Lumji , Ozzy , Snakey
exceL eSports: Jenko, Mole, Kryptix, Smooya, Jesp
ichael “Duck” Moriarty – UKCSGO JournalistMichael is one of our journalists here at UKCSGO, he has written for many different organisation websites including Team Acer, Ninjas in Pyjamas and Reason Gaming. He currently writes for ESL with some IEM posts he has done over the last few months. 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. However he is starting to build on his awareness of the UK Scene in CS:GO and has valid ideas of what teams should be doing what. Michael will be taking on Tuesday night matches in UK Masters.
Ryan is one of the UK’s leading stars when it comes to commentating. Having started at epic.LAN last year for epic.SEVENTEEN, as an admin, he ended up going to Dreamhack Summer last June on behalf of CAZ eSports, then shortly after that he dived into casting, and got to cast events such as UK Premiership, UK Masters, Starladder, and WESG. He has an in depth knowledge around the UK Esports scene, and continues to thrive on casting events. Ryan will be taking on Wednesday night matches in UK Masters.
Callum has been working himself through the ranks over the last year, having won epic.NINETEEN back in October last year, he has the insight to help the panel come to some better conclusions on what should happen in the matches from week to week. Callum currently plays for Chrome Gaming who narrowly missed out in UK Masters and didn’t quite make it to the ESL Premiership either, but he knows how competitive the scene really is. Callum will be taking on Thursday night matches in UK Masters.
We’re back for a strong matchup between two strong IGLs in the game between resu and Jakem. With both sides having been together for similar lengths in recent history, their teamwork should be on a par with each other. CeX and Imperial are yet to come up against each other in any of the current season’s UK tournaments so there’s not an obvious result to go up against. Both are doing strong, with Imperial and CeX top three of UKGT and Imperial sitting top four of the ESL Prem, there’s not much of a margin between them both.
However, with CeX coming off of a strong LAN showing, albeit with a disappointing showing in the final, they most likely have the edge. If they have players like Astroo going off on a level like the weekend, they have a chance. However, it’s impossible to rule out Imperial when players like conoR would most likely show up.
Prediction: I’m predicting 1:1 in maps here!
The two sides recently played each other just before epic20 this weekend, with Endpoint demolishing SKUM. With two of their players coming back from winning epicLAN, they’ll be feeling as buoyant as ever.
SKUM will need to bring everything out of the cupboard to take on Endpoint head on, to avoid a repeat of Wednesday night. Solid performances from those on the team like DUKK will be the key for them to have a chance, but it’d take a lot to do so.
Prediction: 2:0 Endpoint
Infused is probably the only roster that has me doubtful on a serious note. They’ve had some incredible showings but also some ridiculously weak ones. Last night relying on a CT side cobble to bring things back against Royals UK, they should best them every time. There is much to the Infused roster though, they have that capability, but they are seriously underwhelming at the moment, whereas fish123 being a talented mix often pull out some rather surprising results. This match will be closely fought by both sides, but I just see fish123 pulling out the result here to beat Infused.
Prediction: fish123 will beat Infused 2:0 (albeit very close on scorelines, possibly 16:12/16:13)
Tonight you have pretty much the top dogs in the UK going head to head in one of the potentially best opening series of UK Masters Spring Season. All of these teams are top 2 potential, see leagues such as ESL Premiership, case and point. Both fm-eSports and fish tied up in points with exceL eSports capable of sling shotting themselves up there. This match will be incredibly close, and I cannot see any possible outcome where either team will win this. I reckon it will be 1 all on maps, but both sides with the talent at their disposal will be incredibly interesting to watch. I think people do need to keep a capable eye on to exceL to see how they cope with Smooya however he needs a team who are willing to adapt to his on the fly calling of where he wants to play.
We can’t keep seeing him run aggro mid solo and get picked every other round while his team play 4v5.
Prediction: I feel like fm-eSports & exceL could go 1:1
exceL eSports will be looking to grab this season’s UK Masters title.
FM vs SKUM should be easy for FM in my opinion, FM will completely outclass SKUM in pretty much every aspect and FM are looking very strong after nailing endpoint last night in ESL Premiership however you never know what’s going to happen with NK online he could just get another 60 kill game.. But I highly doubt that.
Prediction: I predict FM to win 2:0 with scorelines coming around 16:7 on both maps
Endpoint vs Fish123 is an interesting one. Endpoint looked pretty weak yesterday vs FM in ESL Premiership and there was twitter drama during it making it look like Endpoint aren’t in the best mindset at the moment as teammates, which makes me think that Fish123 could take the series 2:0 if Endpoint perform like they did yesterday. It’s hard to predict and I think the scoreline is one of a close nature, with both sides going to take a map each 16:14, I reckon.
Prediction: If I had to make a final prediction I’d say Endpoint are going to focus up after yesterday and the end result will be Endpoint 1:1.
We will have more coverage of the UK Masters 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 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.
It may not be the ELEAGUE Atlanta Major, but the UK has some of it’s own domestic LAN events to look forward to. The first UK LAN is always a highly competitive affair, mixed with a lot of intriguing results, new lineups, and incredible drama to boot. With epic.TWENTY around the corner in the next couple of weeks, I have started sitting down with various team representatives and their thoughts on a wide ranging array of subjects going over previous LAN results, their thoughts on the UK Scene, epic.LAN in general, and their own team and what they are hoping to achieve with the current roster. This is the third of six interviews with various team captains and team players. This time we speak to Nika “NK” Khaburzania, who is team captain of SKUM Gaming.
Nika isn’t really known in this neck of the woods. His history actually begins in Georgia, and when he was a younger person at 10 – 11 years old, he would be travelling around the country for various LAN events in Counter-Strike 1.6. He went on to play for the national team of Georgia in the Clanbase Nations Cup (one of the biggest online websites at the time for leagues, events and competitions) and also featured in the European Nations Championship which was also hosted by Clanbase at the time.
After the CS 1.6 era came to a close, and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive rolled in, Nika decided it was time to take a competitive break, and focus on his studies. In 2014, things changed, and he ended up playing in Georgia’s World Championship’s side in CS:GO for the next two years. Unfortunately the team didn’t quite qualify for the playoffs.
After moving to the UK for the purposes around studies, Nika managed to team up with Hawkins, and actively played in Gfinity’s weekly cups. He also competed in theNUEL’s University League, and attended the LAN Finals for that too. Whilst he had been playing during this time, Nika refused an offer from a Russian organisation called ELTZ, which is a team that has developed some of the CS:GO scene’s finest talents such as Mou & s1mple. However, just after insomnia59, and the former SKUM Gaming breaking up after a fairly successful LAN event (making it to R1 of the reformed Elimination bracket), Nika & Hawkins managed to form a new team with DUKK, Mmuffin & FiLLeR which is now on a path to epic.TWENTY and future LAN events this year.
Nika at a Georgian LAN event
Talk me around your team, and the roles within your team, and how all of you came to be?
Hawkins & I have been playing together for more than 2 years. I always believed one day we could make UK team that could succeed, and I still believe in this. Hawkins introduced me to DUKK, we started playing together and we actually enjoyed it. The idea to create a team together was born at that point. Muffin and Filler used to play together in a team and they were great pair, we knew they were looking for a new team and we asked them to join us.
About the roles, DUKK is main awper for our team, muffin is the best support player I have ever played with, hawkins is cold blooded entry fragger which hates playing slow because can’t wait to kill people, filler has lurking role in the team. I am in-game leader and secondary awper. We’ve been a team for just over a month now, after both Muffin & Filler were part of the former SKUM Gaming who headed to insomnia59 in December.
What are the particular hopes and aims of this current lineup, and how well do you get on with each other outside of the game?
We want a seat at the table in this scene and we are working hard for it. We hope to do well on epic20, get in top4 in UK Gaming Tours, and win ESEA open. This team is very ambitious and we are never happy with our results, we try to improve after each game, I think without ambition there will be no success in any sport, and ambition is something that keeps players work really hard. Our main hope and goal is to prove ourselves on LAN. We are all good friends outside of the game, there is great chemistry between us which helps us a lot.
Last week, there was a particularly controversial sentiment put out about you as a player, talk me through the match against exceL eSports and how well you all seemed to play in that match?
I think exceL players played better then us individually, and the reason was my teammate’s gave them a lot of respect. It was our first match against a team of that calibre from UK and when you are playing your countrymen you want to prove yourself even more, its not only about qualifying. All of this led to my players being a little bit nervous and could not show full potential, I could see that as their IGL. On the other side, I did not know their history so I did not give them the comfort of playing as favourites.
In overtime, I started to get nervous as we were on edge of winning/losing and we gave them a 1v4 situation, which means a lot in the grand scheme of things. I also started making stupid mistakes and not thinking a lot, but I guess the other team were in the same situation too. In the end, we won and I think reason was that they gave us too much space.
I could just go underpass to connector every round from T side in overtime and lurk until I could kill them all from behind, without them punishing me. Same happened from CT, I went to palace about 6-7 times without getting punished. Now, after reviewing POV of the match with the team, I can say that they would win if they did not give me that much space.
Mole was particularly aggrieved by the match against SKUM Gaming.
Was there a particular turning point in that match that you feel was the reason for you winning and ultimately progressing?
I don’t think there was a particular turning point. The turning point would be if we lost the game because of the 1v4 in the last round, but after that it was always back and forth, until one team came out as a winner. I think there were many mistakes from both teams and that led to many overtimes.
How do you feel the cheating allegations will specifically help or hinder you at next week’s epic.TWENTY?
Well, that’s a hard question. I guess only time will tell. I don’t think it matters a lot for me, generally its always hard to play under pressure, does not matter what is the reason of being under pressure, but I am confident that I will help my team to take top place in the tournament, I know what I am capable of and I won’t be expecting anything less than that from myself.
Turning to epic.TWENTY in a week, what are your thoughts on epic.LAN as an event, what attracted you and your team to the event, and how do you see the event in terms of success?
We’re attracted due to the fact that it is the first UK LAN of the year and we’re excited to see how we compete against the other UK teams as we’re still relatively inexperienced in that respect.
How confident are you about your team’s chances at epic.TWENTY? Where are you realistically looking to finish?
It’s our first LAN together, of course we want to win it, but we won’t be disappointed with a fourth place finish for example. So realistically we are aiming for top 4 finish.
Is there any team you are potentially looking at, like a dark horse to be worried about?
There is no-one we are specifically looking at, we just want to go there and play our game without thinking about our opponents. I think everyone will be looking at us to see how we perform offline, around the accusations against me. From talent going, it should be a close LAN, where anything can happen and anyone can take it.
In your honest opinion, who is the star player on your team, and outside of just the game, what do they bring to the table?
Honestly, if you go through our past games, we have no specific star player. Every player carries the team at some point and does tend to show up their star potential when it matters. We’ve only recently started playing together so I guess time will show who will take the star role. I’m being very diplomatic at this point.
What are your thoughts on the UK Scene currently, do you feel it is a much tougher scene now or do you feel there is still much to do within the scene?
From what I can see, there are some great players individually, but teams are not playing strategically. Also, many talented players are playing with different mixes in every tournament. I think this is the main problem of UK scene at the moment, teams should stick together for longer period, as success does not come within days. Also, players should give more respect to newcomers and help support them. If everyone is toxic to each other, they will never want to play together in future, which is a big problem.
How have you found your online games in the various leagues and events you participate in and how much do you read into any surprising results you may suffer?
We haven’t had any upsets we’ve either won or drawn our league games and with regards to losing a couple maps it tends to be due to miscommunication or the fact we’re still learning each others play-styles.
Any final shoutouts?
I want to thank SKUM Gaming for all their support, especially Sinatra and HB. I also want to thank my team for being with me when I needed the most.
SKUM Gaming are heading to epic.TWENTY with the following roster:
Nika “NK” Khaburzania
Christopher “MMuffin” Williams
Jack “DUKK” Mason
Rhys “Hawkins” Hawkins
Daniel “FiLLeR” Gunko
We will be having three more interviews over the coming week with a variety of teams, so make sure you keep in touch with UKCSGO in the run up and during epic.TWENTY through our Facebook & Twitter pages.
Earlier today, exceL Esports accused SKUM of cheating in the UK Masters qualifiers yesterday. After many accusations were thrown from exceL’s side of the court, and the UK scene subsequently broke out into civil war, Nika “NK” Khaburzania finally responded to the accusations brought before him in a TwitLonger post.
After three qualifiers, and four contentious invites, the ten teams for the inaugural season of the UK Gaming Tours have been completed. All of these teams are set for play, when the league starts on the 17th January. All of which intend to battle it out for spots to the LAN finals.
