Editorial: HLTV writers predict Europe RMRs

Which of the underdogs are geared to surprise and which of the main favorites are most likely to fail?

Qualifying for the Shanghai Major has reached the halfway point with Asia and Americas done and dusted, and all that is left is for Europe's two groups to deliver 14 teams to the biggest Counter-Strike competition there is.

HLTV's writing staff has come together for a round of predictions for the biggest region of them all. Each writer made his case for a pick of an underdog to surprise and the most likely favorite to fail, and this is how it has turned out:

NER0's hipster pick: GamerLegion

GamerLegion are a ridiculously young team. Only support player Sebastian "⁠volt⁠" Maloș has played a Major before. They've played just one LAN, a last-placed finish at BLAST Fall Groups.

But online, their resilience has been forged in the fires of tier-two. A round-of-16 loss to GUN5 brought an end to a streak of four grand-final appearances in a row in CCT's European series.

Coach Ashley "⁠ash⁠" Battye knows what it takes to surprise at a Major, let alone an RMR, and his young troops are primed to surprise again. Signing Sebastian "⁠Tauson⁠" Tauson Lindelof for Andreas "⁠aNdu⁠" Maasing was a surprise (albeit for out-of-server reasons) but the Dane has been solid, while Timur "⁠FL4MUS⁠" Marev is the type of player who could catch fire at this type of event. Henrich "⁠sl3nd⁠" Hevesi, too, always delivers.

Add in a Group A that is wide open after the four big dogs, and GamerLegion look even more likely to overcome their No. 10 seed to secure another batch of stickers.

NER0's favorite most likely to fail: FaZe

One of those four 'big dogs' is FaZe, who have been oscillating between hopeful and dire since the break.

The team knows all about disastrous Swiss stages (even if no Kosovans have made it into Group A) and there is a cloud of uncertainty around the roster with Finn "⁠karrigan⁠" Andersen and Håvard "⁠rain⁠" Nygaard's ability to keep Father Time at bay under pressure like never before.

Robin "⁠ropz⁠" Kool has improved, but he and Helvijs "⁠broky⁠" Saukants are still far from their 2022 peaks. I also cannot shake the feeling that David "⁠frozen⁠" Čerňanský, as well as he frags, has made this team worse.

Players (and callers) of this quality should make the Major, of course. But it's not hard to see a future of a 'disappointing' RMR where they have a slow start, stumble versus the underdogs, and scrape through in the seventh-place decider. "FaZe bullshit" is the foundation of the team's old creaky mansion, even as leaks keep popping up all over the roof. Under pressure in Shanghai, we could see them burst.

Sumljiv's hipster pick: 9 Pandas

Yes, they're doing it again, and they might actually get to play the Major this time. Their previous RMR escapades in Bucharest, where they qualified through the Last Chance Qualifier, prompted quite a bit of fanfare and convinced a certain HLTV writer to write a feature article and add to the hype.

That piece ended up aging like fine milk, however, as visa issues ruled 9 Pandas out of the Major and consequently ruined Nicolas "⁠Keoz⁠" Dgus' bubble-tea vacation after GamerLegion were called in to replace the Russian squad.

But I believe they still have what it takes to repeat the feat. While Denis "⁠seized⁠" Kostin isn't there anymore, he has been replaced by Aleksandr "⁠shalfey⁠" Marenov, who has proven to be an improvement in the fragging department at the very least. Evgeny "⁠r3salt⁠" Frolov, who joined the team to "fuck even harder than he was before," is their other new addition. But the most important thing is that 30-year-old Aleksandr "⁠glowiing⁠" Matsievich continues to frag, and that's what we're all here for.

Sumljiv's favorite most likely to fail: Eternal Fire

This is for all the 'EF tier-one?' forum threads. While Eternal Fire are certainly not a bad team, I think their recent results have overblown their standing. The Turkish squad has reached some high peaks — they beat MOUZ at BB Dacha Belgrade and Vitality at ESL Pro League S20 —, but their lows have been equally bad.

The latest low came at IEM Rio, where the Turkish side gave Astralis their first win under Casper "⁠cadiaN⁠" Møller before getting eliminated by The MongolZ after winning a combined six T rounds across the best-of-three. Perhaps the most concerning performance was their ESL Challenger Katowice campaign, though, where two losses to B8 condemned them to a group-stage exit despite Ismailcan "⁠XANTARES⁠" Dörtkardeş finishing the event as the highest-rated player (1.39).

Something isn't quite right in the Eternal Fire camp, and the high-stakes nature of the RMR might be the exact environment to compound their woes.

Draik's hipster pick: GamerLegion

Fielding an almost entirely brand new roster from their Copenhagen Major qualifying campaign, GamerLegion have been performing particularly well in many of their online outings in recent months.

Although the team lacks LAN experience, the sequestered atmosphere of the RMR matches should help GamerLegion in leveling the playing field against teams more accustomed to LAN environments.

An opening match versus Vitality certainly does not do them any favors, but Erik "⁠ztr⁠" Gustafsson's men should be more than capable of moving past the lower-ranked sides in the RMR while giving teams like Falcons a run for their money, giving them a fair shot at a Major spot.

Draik's favorite most likely to fail: FaZe

Despite the pedigree of FaZe's players, the international combine has displayed a wildly inconsistent form throughout 2024. Capable of beating Natus Vincere while also faltering to teams like Sangal, FaZe seem like the most likely candidate out of the top sides in attendance to struggle in this RMR.

Natus Vincere, Vitality, and MOUZ will all certainly pose problems for karrigan's troops in RMR A, but losses to rising teams like SAW and the aforementioned Sangal could quickly put FaZe's Major hopes in jeopardy if they are unable to sort out the issues they have with their floor.

MIRAA's hipster pick: 9 Pandas

9 Pandas travel to Shanghai with the wind in their sails after winning their last two tournaments, Winline Insight Season 6 and the European Pro League Season 20. What's more impressive is that they dropped only one map in the ten series that they played across the two tournaments.

After missing the Copenhagen Major in heartbreaking fashion due to visa issues, the Russian team is keen on making the cut and finally adding their name to the list of organizations that have played at Majors. Late bloomer glowiing is always a fun player to watch, and the recent arrival of r3salt has provided the team with even more firepower.

MIRAA's favorite most likely to fail: Virtus.pro

Virtus.pro have been such a convoluted mess that their missing the Major is not out of the realm of possibility. There is a sense that the Russian team is a "dead man walking" after so many underwhelming results in 2024, and the end of the year could bring some changes to the squad.

Dempz's hipster pick: Sangal

Sangal have generated quite a bit of hype for themselves since constructing their lineup earlier this year. They quickly began to rack up tier-two online tournament wins in events like CCT Series, RES Regional Series and ESL Challenger League, thus rocketing up the world rankings, and it felt like something special was brewing ahead of their LAN debut at ESL Pro League Season 20.

Whilst the squad failed to make EPL playoffs, wins over FaZe and HEROIC gave us a tantalizing glimpse of of what the young squad was capable of. We saw that Yasin "⁠xfl0ud⁠" Koç and Samet "⁠jottAAA⁠" Köklü could be a legit firepower duo, we saw that Linus "⁠LNZ⁠" Holtäng could call a good game, and that the team could be potent on both CT and T side. Most importantly, Sangal got to cut their teeth in exactly the type of LAN environment they will be exposed to at the RMR.

The final factor firmly in Sangal's favour is that they find themselves competing in Europe RMR A. Beyond the top four seeming set in stone, this RMR group is wide open. Sangal may very well peer around at the rest of the field and consider themselves the best of the rest, and they'd have a strong case. The rest of the teams are the type of opponents Sangal beat week in, week out, so expect them to continue to do so in Shanghai to secure their Major berth.

Dempz's favorite most likely to fail: FaZe

This one doesn't need too much explaining. FaZe regularly start slowly in events, often needing their first series to serve as a splash of cold water to the face to wake them up. They are in a troublesome patch of form that stretches back months at this point. Finally, they've struggled badly at an RMR before and almost bombed out, at the RMR for BLAST.tv Paris Major, needing the Last Chance Qualifier to earn their Major berth.

FaZe just aren't able to make it work right now, and it seems inevitable that changes are coming at the end of the year. ropz and frozen seem just too similar as players to make shine consistently in the same team, broky is struggling to string together multiple good events in a row, and all of this is putting too much pressure on rain and karrigan to find more individual impact. With all of this in mind, there isn't an elite team more likely to fail.

Lucas's hipster pick: Sangal

Sangal may not be the sexiest squad in the lineup, but their slow burn from being outside of the top 100 in the team ranking at the beginning of the year to making three LANs — including ESL Pro League and an RMR — makes them a great outside underdog pick. More than that, the fact that they beat FaZe and HEROIC on LAN at Pro League shows that they have some punch beyond playing at home and drinking a Coke with no pressure, which is probably the best quality a team can have going into an RMR.

But beyond Sangal’s record, there’s the human side that makes one want to cheer for them.

LNZ came up with Young Ninjas and got a shot in Ninjas in Pyjamas, although he couldn’t make it stick and went back down to the academy team. After getting a bit of a big head, he has been humbled enough since then that his fight back to the top carries added weight. xfl0ud similarly didn’t work out in Eternal Fire when he got the chance, but with Sangal he has returned to the great form that got him noticed in the first place.

Read more

Sangal: From outsiders to Shanghai Major hopefuls

The most exciting prospect for me is watching jottAAA. If he can keep fragging the way he does day in and day out, but at a tournament of this level and against some of the best teams in the world, it could be a breakout tournament for him — especially if Sangal get the results to go with it —, and nothing is as exciting as watching up-and-comers throw their hat in the ring.

Lucas's favorite most likely to fail: Falcons

The RMR is the highest-pressure tournament on the calendar, even more than the Major it serves as a qualifier for. So, if any team can keep their cool, it’ll be a bunch of 26 to 34-year-olds with myriad Major titles and Top 20 Players of Year awards. Therefore, I think Falcons have a fair shot at making it to the Major just by the players’ pedigrees, especially when compared to a much less experienced field fighting for the three Major slots awarded to the 5-7th place finishers. How is that a failure, you say?

The birds of prey, who have actually become the prey with only one victory in their last 15 matches, come into the RMR ranked in 24th place behind Natus Vincere, Vitality, MOUZ, FaZe, and SAW. Falcons then spearhead the rest of the field who will be fighting for the remaining spots. These damning statistics mean there is a real chance of utter failure for Falcons, but the reason I’m picking them is that there’s no real victory for them even if they do make the Major because the team’s name has been so tarnished that scraping through won’t repair the damage.

Falcons have already misfired so much since the superteam’s inception and have been so mismanaged that benching their best-performing player, Álvaro "⁠SunPayus⁠" García, was seen as more of a diversionary tactic or a ploy to milk Oleksandr "⁠s1mple⁠" Kostyliev’s return after his sabbatical than a serious sporting decision. That became just one more reason that those watching will likely pile the schadenfreude on a botched project that’s dead in the water before roster changes happen at the end of the year.

Striker's hipster pick: Falcons

Falcons' sixth-highest ranking in their RMR group makes their chances sound pretty good when seven Major spots are up for grabs. However, when that ranking is 24th in the world and their only win in the last 15 games is against ATOX — you read that right —, plus they're on a 0-7 map streak with s1mple, you'd be hard-pressed to think Falcons are likely to qualify.

We all know this team is effectively dead. Nikola "⁠NiKo⁠" Kovač's reportedly due to join and it'd be a surprise if the changes ended there going into 2025. Much like for Schrödinger's cat, that can mean two things.

Demotivated knowing this team won't last and with confidence at an all-time low after their results, Falcons could easily go out with a whimper. Or, knowing the pressure is off and that this is their last chance to show themselves at a time when many teams are looking at changes could be a recipe for success in their last ride out together.

My money is on the latter. s1mple is hungry to keep showing himself and reignite his career, and I saw firsthand in Katowice that his competitive spirit is just as strong as before. Call them old, but regardless of their current form Falcons have all the pedigree to perform in an environment most find intimidating. Their age may actually be a benefit in an RMR full of inexperience.

Striker's favorite most likely to fail: Virtus.pro

Ever since Denis "⁠electroNic⁠" Sharipov joined Virtus.pro, the team has never felt like a true unit. Awkward situations that go from the save-heavy VP of old in one moment to a headless rush in the next have plagued them for months now, and there doesn't seem to be a way out.

A playoffs finish at IEM Rio offered the Russian side a brief respite before they bombed out of the Thunderpick World Championship after two losses to OG of all teams, sending the team back to square one. Virtus.pro have a decent ceiling but a weak floor and, in the more even group where they're a middle-of-the-road team, that could very well end up costing them.