CS:GO – DreamHack Open November 2021 Playoffs Preview

The Playoff Stage of the first post-Major tournament will be underway tomorrow! Four of the eight teams remain; the top 2 teams of the two groups. BIG, fnatic, MOUZ, and ENCE will fight it out for a coveted spot in the ESL Pro League Conference Season 15, along with a $50,000 dollar cash prize for the winner. Within 24 hours, the two semifinals and the Grand Final will be concluded and a winner will emerge. Let’s take a quick look at how we reached here.

The Group Stage Story

Group A

• BIG: 2-0; Victories against MAD Lions and Team GamerLegion
• MAD Lions: 2-1; Victories against MOUZ (Twice) and Loss against BIG
• MOUZ: 1-2; Victory against GamerLegion and Losses against MAD Lions (Twice)
• Team GamerLegion: 0-2: Losses against BIG and MOUZ

In Group A, BIG and MAD Lions qualified for the Playoffs.

MOUZ shockingly crashed out, with both of their losses coming at the hands of MAD Lions. The mixed efforts from frozen, ropz and acoR proved to be fruitless as the Lions chewed down the Mouse repeatedly. MOUZ’s only win came against Team GamerLegion, where frozen’s 1.55 rating masterclass proved more than enough.

BIG qualified by beating MAD Lions and Team GamerLegion, and their qualification was barely a surprise. No one person stood out in particular, as the team efforts of BIG reigned supreme over everyone else.

MAD Lions definitely created a Cindrella story by qualifying for the Playoffs by beating one of the strongest teams twice, sandwiched between a loss. It came against BIG, where they were humiliated on Mirage. In the decider match against MOUZ, they came back from 11-4 in the first map to win 16-13. Then on MOUZ’s pick, Nuke, the Lions humiliated them 12-3 in the first half and soon went on to close the series and qualify for the Playoffs. Woro2k performed great, as expected, but help from jL and TMB cannot be overlooked.

Team GamerLegion couldn’t win a single match, but they did manage to take one map off BIG, thanks to iM’s insane 1.52 rating performance. But that was not even nearly enough for GamerLegion to put up a fight for the Playoffs, as the Romanian iM crashed out of the tournament.

Group B

• fnatic: 2-0; Victories against Team Spirit and ENCE
• forZe: 2-1; Victory against Team Spirit and ENCE and Loss against ENCE
• ENCE: 1-2; Victory against forZe and Losses against fnatic and forZe
• Team Spirit: 0-2; Losses against fnatic and forZe

In Group B, fnatic and forZe qualified for the Playoffs.

fnatic went on a flawless run of 4 map wins, having the opponent reach double-digit rounds in only one map. After a 16-9 win on Mirage against Spirit, fnatic humiliated the Russian team 16-4 on Inferno, thanks to great collective performances from the whole team. fnatic denied ENCE an amazing comeback to close the first map 16-14. The second map was relatively easy and fnatic closed it out 16-9. fnatic look extremely strong going into the Playoffs.

Opposite of fnatic, Team Spirit spectacularly crashed out, winning not even a single map. After a loss to fnatic, they faced forZe in an elimination match. After fighting extremely hard on the first map but losing in overtime, Team Spirit theatrically collapsed on their own map pick, losing 16-0 on Nuke.

sdy will never forget this disaster, as he couldn’t get even a single kill in 16 rounds. degster was the best player on the team, and yet he only had 7 kills. Team Spirit needed a wake-up call and nothing wakes you up like losing 16-0 on your own map pick.

ENCE did well in the start, as expected, but soon fell apart. fnatic were very strong and ENCE couldn’t even win one map against them. That put them in the elimination match against forZe and since they had defeated them 2-0 earlier, this victory seemed like a given. After winning forZe’s map pick, Ancient, it would take a miracle for them to lose on the next two maps. So they lost in the next two maps.

Extremely strong and revitalized performances from forZe norwi meant Nuke and Mirage went the Russian way and forZe had pulled out an incredible comeback against the strongest team at this tournament, at least HLTV World Ranking wise.

forZe qualified for the Playoffs and the general prediction that ENCE and Team Spirit, the teams present at the Major, would make it out of the Group Stage completely turned on its head, upside down. ENCE and Spirit have had disasters here and it’s forZe and fnatic instead who advance further into the tournament.

Magic in Group B.

Playoffs Prediction

fnatic seem to be the strongest by miles. Despite smooya’s underperformance, the team stepped up and cleanly won 4-0 in the Group Stage. That must inspire a lot of confidence in the Swedish/English members, and they seem to be the most likely to win the tournament. BIG seems to be the only team that could make fnatic run for their money, and since both BIG and fnatic topped their group stage, they won’t face each other in the semi-finals, but most likely will meet each other in Bo5 Grand Final.

forZe will challenge BIG in the semi-final and fnatic will be hoping for forZe to win, since BIG is much stronger on paper than forZe. MAD Lions’ dream run could end in the semis as they face a rock-solid fnatic and all things considered, even reaching double digits against them in any map can be taken as a positive for the Spanish organization.

In the end, it’s safe to predict that BIG and fnatic will win their respective semifinal matches against relatively weaker opponents and then face off in a majestic Grand Final. After a few back-and-forth affairs, fnatic will manage to end the Bo5 match by winning the tournament.

We can only hope and wish for another exciting set of matches, and if the Group Stages are anything to go by, the CS world shall not be disappointed.