ESL Pro League XVI: Liquid vs Movistar Riders

[Mary C]

The ESL Pro League Season 16 opener between Team Liquid and Movistar will take place on September 21. Which group will be dominant will shortly be known. The game will begin at 1:30 AM.

BLAST Premier Fall Groups 2022 saw excellent performance from Team Liquid. The team was successful in placing 1-3, earning a spot in the Fall Final. At the competition, the lads just lost once to Natus Vincere. However, they were successful in winning every other game. Yekindar is a fantastic addition to the team and has emerged as its focal point. The fifth member of Team Liquid is currently listed as unknown on HLTV; however, YEKINDAR has been confirmed for ESL Pro League Season 16; thus, he should take part in the competition. He currently plays a crucial role for the team. Team Liquid will attack Nuke in the upcoming game, taking out one of their opponent's best maps. Team Liquid must choose either Vertigo or Mirage. The Mirage selection is more likely given that they lost to Vertigo in their most recent meeting. The club has a perfect winning percentage on this particular map. However, the overall performance for the Spanish team is only 33%. Mirage seemed too promising. I don't believe the Spaniards will be capable of competing against Team Liquid considering the defeats Movistar Riders suffered against 1WIN and ECLOT on this map. 

  

The Movistar Riders have not been recently performing well. In their last six games, the team has just one victory. First, the Spaniards lost to B8 in the third open qualification round for the Road to Rio 2022. Then Movistar Riders fell at the SteelSeries Nova Cup Tournament in Dash 2 where they took last place after dropping all of their games (their adversaries weren't even among the top 50 of the HLTV ranking). Although being highly ranked, the team doesn't play well. Yes, the boys had time to be ready for the competition, but it's not apparent if they were able to address the issues with the game. The team will probably choose Ancient given the restriction on nuclear weapons. In their previous head-to-head matchup, they had already defeated Team Liquid. It is absurd to alter what is effective. More so, it is because the other maps are substantially poorer. Movistar Riders may certainly claim Ancient for themselves, but on the other maps, Americans appear to be the front-runners, especially in light of how the lineups are now set out.