IEM6 WC quarter finals preview

The group stage at IEM6 World Championships is over with SK Gaming, Natus Vincere, ESC Gaming, Lions, Moscow Five and fnatic advancing to playoffs. Here's a preview of the upcoming quarter finals.

ESL is once again using their by now standard format where the group winners advance directly to the semi finals of the single elimination best-of-three bracket, while the second and third placing teams play each other in the quarter finals.

On the top side of the bracket we have SK Gaming waiting to face the winner of today's first quarter final between ESC Gaming and Moscow Five at 12:15 . Lower side features group B winner Lions, currently in semi finals while fnatic and Natus Vincere will take on each other in the second quarter final at 15:00 .

12:15 ESC Gaming vs Moscow Five

16-9	vs mousesports	16-14	vs eSahara
16-6	vs TyLoo	16-9	vs semXorah
16-9	vs Anexis	15-15	vs WinFakt
4-16	vs SK Gaming	8-16	vs Lions
14-16	vs Natus Vincere	16-9	vs fnatic

This is an interesting match up that hasn't been featured too often in a LAN setting, as the teams have only faced each other at SEC where M5 was infamously not in perfect condition to play CS. Online the teams have met a couple of times in the recent months, with Moscow Five coming out on top. However, worth remembering is that ESC, the most out of all teams possibly, has always been a very weak team online in comparison to their LAN performances. In the group stage ESC looked strong early on as they ran over the weaker opposition, but tough losses against SK Gaming and Na`Vi could have hurt their morale a little. Moscow Five on the other hand suffered a tough loss against Lions and failed to close a 15-11 lead versus WinFakt but beat eSAHARA, semXorah and fnatic.

Player of the year 2011 representing ESC Gaming

Map wise I expect the Poles to get rid of de_forge and de_mirage, which we don't really see them playing. I know they have been practicing de_mirage, but even though M5 lost to Lions on it, I don't think Filip "NEO" Kubski's team wants to roll the dice on it. Moscow Five on the other hand should get rid of de_train and de_dust2, which should give us a best-of-three series featuring de_nuke, de_inferno and de_tuscan. Out of those maps, I think de_tuscan favors Moscow Five even though ESC has improved on it quite a lot and now can actually have competitive matches on it. Moscow Five hasn't played it for a while in a tournament though, as they have seemed to prefer de_inferno over it ever since DreamHack Winter. Remaining map de_nuke is a toss up as I think it's one of the strongest maps for both teams and should set a stage for some very entertaining Counter-Strike.

Moscow Five faces their toughest challenge yet at IEM6 WC 

Mihail "Dosia" Stolyarov has been leading the Russians in every single way so far in this tournament, and a lot of weight is on his shoulders once again tomorrow as he has literally been carrying the rest of his team so far in this tournament if you look at statistics. Over in the ESC camp the gap isn't quite as big, but Kubski is still the most dominant player over there and has been in the tournament as well. Overall, ESC is the better team of the two and will probably end up advancing to the semi finals, but I could see de_nuke and de_inferno going either way.

Prediction: ESC > M5 2-1

15:00 fnatic vs Natus Vincere

16-6	vs Lions	15-15	vs SK Gaming
3-16	vs WinFakt	16-14	vs mousesports
16-8	vs eSahara	6-16	vs TyLoo
16-14	vs semXorah	16-14	vs Anexis
9-16	vs Moscow Five	16-14	vs ESC Gaming

This could potentially be the last match in Patrik "cArn" Sättermon's long career as he will be retiring from competitive Counter-Strike after IEM6 WC. While fnatic has had success against the reigning IEM world champions in the past, so far in this tournament Na`Vi has definitely looked to be more on point. Na`Vi had some very close games in the group stage, but the reason I think it might end up benefiting them in the long run is that they seemed to get in a lot of arguments during their group stage games, and going through the comebacks they did already on day one must have boosted their team moral immensely. I mean, just look at the video below. fnatic on the other hand had a rough group stage which saw them take down Lions and the two weaker teams (although semXorah required some heroics from the retiree himself in a 2on5 situation with a 12-14 scoreline) but suffer losses versus WinFakt and Moscow Five. They will surely need to play better tomorrow if they wish to have a competitive game, though.

fnatic in action at IEM6 WC 

When it comes to maps, Na`Vi will obviously once again remove de_nuke, and probably de_mirage as the second map. I believe fnatic will get rid of de_forge and de_dust2, which would give us a series featuring de_tuscan, de_inferno and de_train. While fnatic has scored wins over the Ukrainians on de_train and are certainly capable of it, I think in the long run Yegor "markeloff" Markelov's team is stronger on the map. I think de_tuscan will probably be a fairly close call and I could see either team taking it, assuming fnatic picks it up and doesn't play the way they did against WinFakt in group stage. As far as the possible deciding map goes, I would say Na`Vi has seemed stronger on de_inferno so far in the tournament after the three close games they had on it. fnatic on the other hand lost against M5 and had a shaky win over Gabriel "FalleN" Toledo's team, and didn't seem as sharp on it overall.

fnatic is likely to improve more on their earlier form before this match as they seemed to be in fairly weak shape overall, but still good enough to advance thanks to their win over countrymen Lions. Rasmus "Gux" Ståhl has been very underwhelming so far in this tournament and Andreas "MODDII" Fridh is yet to impress as well. If fnatic wants to win, their main two fraggers will have to start playing like they can and hope to score wins that way. While no one from Na`Vi played absolutely great in group stage either, they've had one more day off and given proper warmup time I think they will have the advantage in that department as well, and come up with a win, whether it's 2-0 or 2-1.

Prediction: fnatic < Natus Vincere 0-2

HLTV.org will continue to provide full coverage of the event so stay tuned to the quarter finals today, semi finals and third place decider on Friday and the grand final on Saturday.