Thanks to Bacillus we have predictions for this week also!

Bacillus' Div 1 Week 1 Aftermath:

Flatline - Snowrollers

As expected, this turned out to be the more even of the two matches. Snowrollers managed to put up a good fight here and there, but eventually Flatline still finished with a comfortable 3-1 victory. Nevertheless, I was a little disappointed how both teams managed to fumble their marine rounds to some quite bad mistakes.

Flatline 3 quite solid rounds. Especially their alien play was still quite impressive. Phil's lerk tore SR's marine game apart with the constant sporing and LMG biting. Handschuh and Morvie's fades took care of the rest. Their marine rounds on the other hand left room for some improvement. Phil and Morvie were a little inconsistent and weren't the destructive force I had expected. Both still had their moments of great play, but then again also a pressure death to a single skulk, for example. Nevertheless, they're still doing a good job all around. Meanwhile Cosmic really stepped up her marine game. She got nice early lerk kills on both maps. Especially the Tanith round LMG solo on Enigmatic's lerk was crucial and allowed Flatline to set up for spawncamp a little later. The eclipse marine round, however, wasn't something I'd expect to see from FL. The early game was quite even, but the 2nd hive push from FL seemed like a bad fumble to me. Two shotguns manage to secure the growing eclipse hive area and force the fade to flee for healing. For some reason they still drop the eclipse siege area pg for a lone LMG, instead of getting the pg directly to the hive room with 2 shotguns covering. The LMG goes down and the hive goes up. The momentum swung for the SR and FL couldn't recover anymore. Obiously it's easy to comment on HLTV demos afterwards, but I still feel they should've been able to capitalize the situation easily.

SR was a little disappointment to me. They had some great moments, but then again a few more really bad plays. The alien part was ok, although the two flashed lerks weren't the best demonstration of Enigmatic's skill. On Tanith they played quite passive, allowing the FL 2 man pressure to keep skulks tied to the nodes. Meanwhile FL capped, pushed to the main hive with cappers and caused enough of carnage to seal the deal. Bergy's skulking was the biggest positive impact in the alien rounds. On Eclipse he took down most of the pressure teams in power sub area, and ensured SR a relatively early hive even though they lost a lot of nodes. SR's marine rounds were the biggest disappointment to me. They were sloppy both on individual level and on the map play in general. Phil's lerk effectively kept them at low upgrades and they never got any offensive PGs up. On Tanith round they had a nice opening to push the 2nd hive at sat while it was just being dropped. However, the two LMGs went into chem first, got taken out by Phil's lerk and the shotgun following 10 sec behind had very little chances of surviving to the sat. 10 sec spent waiting for the SG could've swung the momentun into a whole new direction. Gibbz was the cornerstone of SR's marine rounds, but you'll need more than one player playing on that level against FL.


Russia - Gangbang

The match went as expected. Gangbang was one step ahead most of the game and finished with a comfortable 4-0.

Once again Team Ru left me puzzled. Their top marine Snake went comming, which didn't turn out to be a great success. Interesting spread LMG pressure on eclipse had very little success, except for keeping the 2 marine nodes at T-junc and alpha up. Later on they managed to get a pg up at cc, and even get armor 1 into the play before Tane could get his fade rolling. Meanwhile, they didn't have 2nd ip or guns to fend off the fade and Tane took the cc pg down relatively easily, practically sealing the round for GB. On Tanith Ru lost obs early to a lone skulk and couldn't really recover due to the effecitve RT biting by GB. The alien rounds were little better for RU and on Tanith they even pulled off a semi successful baserush.

Gangbang was solid. They played well all around and I'd say they are the biggest favorites for the championship title as long as their game stays this good. Tane, Doogie and Kuitmo played well on marines and they capitalized most of the opportunities nicely. They left the base open for rushing in Tanith, but otherwise I didn't see any bigger flaws. On aliens they were never really forced to play to their best, but the overall scouting and lifeform synergy seemed to be working nicely.

Bacillus' Div 1 Week 2 predictions:

Gangbang - Snowrollers

The match of the week. Snowrollers have a lot to improve from week 1 and Gangbang gets tested by tougher opposition than last week.

I'd say it boils down to whether Gangbang can keep their game going as smooth as it was against Ru. SR needs to step up their individual performances, because GB isn't definitely going to slip behind in teamwork. Especially Atman and Bergy have to start hitting aliens on marine rounds. SR also needs to be more aggressive on aliens, since the nice spawncamp manouvres were one of the most effecitve GB moves against. SR simply can't afford to have marines like Kuitmo and Tane running around for too long. Yet another big question is whether the Swedes can manage their resoucres better. Against FL they never got their upgrades and PGs rolling properly and I doubt its going to be that much easier against GB as Peach seems to like to play the res wars.

My pred : GB 3 - 1 SR, Finns taking both round on Origin

Impact players:
GB: Tane, Peach, Kuitmo.
Snowrollers: Atman, Berglund, Gibbz, Enigmatic.

NS-Ru - Flatline

This match is going to be a big indication to the rest of the season. Flatline wasn't as powerful as I expected in week 1, so this week they'll need to prove they can play as cool and controlled as the GB did. Ru on the other hand needs to get their game rolling properly, another 4-0 would raise a lot of questions whether they can match any team in this div.

Both teams need to work on the first week flaws. Ru needs to get their marine tactics and comming rolling better, because otherwise Phil's lerk will absolutely dominate. Snake's medding and res control skills are going to be tested big time against the nice sporing of Phil. On marines FL just needs to keep their game rolling and avoid the mistakes they did in week 1. Phil and Morvie are going to have a nice opportunity to get their marine play back into form before the week 3 GB match. Ru on the other hand has to keep their lerks alive better and generally speaking avoid losing map control like they did in w1 rounds, resulting in PGs planted in middle hives.

Impact players
Flatline: Phil, Morvie, Hivefish, Cosmic
Team Russia : Macpersil, Snake