The IEM Sydney Counter-Strike: Global Offensive final takes place on Sunday, and we preview and predict the championship match.
One Counter-Strike: Global Offensive team will leave IEM Sydney on Sunday with a new title and the biggest share of $200,000 in prize money. Will it be established stalwarts SK Gaming or the fast rising FaZe Clan?
In Saturday’s semifinals SK Gaming flat-out embarrassed OpTic Gaming by sweeping them 2-0 on a pair of maps that were never close. SK dominated OpTic on Train 16-1 before crushing them with a 16-7 score on Overpass.
Four of the five SK Gaming players reached double digits in kills on both maps, whereas only one OpTic player — Mixwell — was able to accomplish the same.
While they weren’t at full manpower (they were playing with their coach Hazed as a stand-in yet again, as they have yet to find a fifth to replace Stanislaw after his February departure to Team Liquid), it’s still disconcerting to see OpTic have so much difficulty.
This is the team that won the second season of ELEAGUE in December and now they always seem to be just a step or two behind the competition, plus winning a grand total of eight out of 40 maps is never good.
The second semifinal saw FaZe Clan get their revenge on Astralis in a rematch of the IEM Katowice Grand Final. This time it was FaZe who came out on top in a hard-fought battle that went the full three maps, 3-1.
FaZe won Cobblestone 16-13, lost Nuke 11-16 and then closed out with a victory on Train 16-9.
It was once again Rain and NiKo who did most of the heavy lifting for FaZe. Rain had almost 30 kills on the first map and 21 on the decider, with NiKo getting more than 20 kills on all three of the maps.
But this was another fantastic battle between these two teams; only one player out of both squads ever got less than 10 kills across the entire match (Dupreeh from Astralis had just 8 on Train).
That sets up Sunday’s Grand Final, which looks like this:
Grand Final: SK Gaming (4-0) vs. FaZe Clan (3-1)
SK comes into this matchup as the hot hand. They’re in their second consecutive final and they are the only team to have run through IEM Sydney undefeated. The duo of Fallen and Coldzera is one that you never want to underestimate. But it’s not necessarily appropriate to judge their chances in the Grand Final by their semifinal performance; yes, they won handily but that’s about both the struggles of OpTic Gaming and how well SK played.
FaZe Clan have to feel good about themselves for not only getting Astralis back after Katowice but also outlasting them in what was a massive slugfest. Many people consider Astralis to be the best CSGO team in the world right now, and both SK and FaZe defeated them in IEM Sydney (SK in the Group Stage, FaZe in the semifinals). How will Rain and NiKo stack up against Fallen and Coldzera?
This is a matchup that honestly could go either way. Both teams have their headline stars, both teams have plenty of experience (although FaZe has not played with their lineup as long as SK has played with theirs), and both teams certainly know how to gut out a win.
Regardless of who holds the trophy, there’s going to be two winners on Sunday: the team and then the CSGO fans who get to watch what should be another great Grand Final in 2017.
Our Prediction: FaZe Clan 2-1
Next: ELEAGUE announces its return to Counter-Strike
The IEM Sydney Grand Final can be streamed live through the ESL channel on Twitch. Broadcast begins at 1 a.m. ET. For the latest news throughout the gaming world, visit the Gaming category at FanSided here.