ESI Esports Gambling Report: Volume 4

There’s another big CS:GO tournament underway, with the DreamHack Masters taking place in Las Vegas this weekend. In Volume 4 of our ESI Esports Gambling Report we have a look across the bookmakers to see where if there’s any ante-post available and to compare the odds for the matches this evening.

The first two days have been and gone; with Mouz, SK, Gambit and world champions Astralis already having successfully navigated their way through the tricky Group Stages at the MGM Casino in Vegas. As expected, underdogs coL, Misfits, TyLoo and Renegades have already departed having lost both of their best of one match-ups. 

In tonight’s games, a new-look OpTic Gaming will face F.C. Copenhagen sponsored North and Virtus.pro will face post-shuffle Fnatic. In an intriguing contest Cloud9 will face NiP once more, following their earlier best of one victory. Finally, Natus Vincere will face Finn “karrigan” Andersen’s FaZe who, after being dismantled by FaZe-bound Bosnian Nikola “NiKo” Kovac (playing his final tournament for Mouz) will be looking to bounce back in a best of three against the CIS juggernaut. 

OpTic vs North

The bookmakers have priced this up similarly across the board, with North tipped to take the series over OpTic. The Danes have had one change to the roster, with Phillip “aizy” Aistrup joining from FaZe in place of Ruben “RUBINO” Villarroel. OpTic are playing with somewhat of a mix team, with Spencer “Hiko” Martin stepping in and Luis “peacemaker” Tadeu as coach.

North bounced back from their day one defeat to brush aside Complexity whilst OpTic looked powerless to stop the Danish champions Astralis on their rampage through to the main event. 

We’re now into the best of threes, and I would say that North look more settled and have the better overall quality. The disparity between odds is not too big here for a reason, but I would fancy North to just edge it. Pinnacle are best priced for a North win at 1.735. 

Virtus.pro vs Fnatic

Fnatic have returned to a roster of old after the ELEAGUE Major so this, on paper this is two titans going head to head. Virtus.pro, as per usual, remain unchanged and although they came up short on Cobble versus Zeus’ Gambit who can beat the best on their day, they should have the ability to dispatch Fnatic here. 

There’s not been long between tournaments and VP will be hungry to avenge their defeat at ELEAGUE whilst the Fnatic players are reacquainting themselves with one another. I would say VP should just be a step too far for Fnatic, and you can find them at 1.689 on Pinnacle.  

Cloud9 vs Ninjas in Pyjamas

This match is more a tale of two perennial under performers, who many suggest need roster changes. Simply put, Ninjas in Pyjamas just don’t have a proficient AWPer – a key position in any game of CS:GO. They keep throwing it  to Jacob “pyth” Mourujarvi who can’t seem to hit his shots at the moment. Their failure to qualify for ELEAGUE was huge, and they didn’t start the tournament electrically when losing to this C9 team in their first match. 

C9 are another team that lack consistency and it’s rare that all five of their players turn up at once. They certainly have some talent across the roster, and with an expected loss to SK yesterday they need to keep morale high going into this. They stumbled past NiP in their first game – but having beaten them once they could well do it again. They’re at 2.20 on Sky Bet if you fancy backing the underdog in this one. 

Natus Vincere vs FaZe

FaZe are most definitely a squad in transition. Superstar fragger NiKo is set to join from MouZ after this tournament and we would expect to see a very different FaZe when that happens. Under the stewardship of Karrigan, FaZe could be up there with the world’s very best in months to come. 

However, this comes as a tournament too early. They’ve lost aizy to North and are yet to play with NiKo so the well established Natus Vincere should be able to win this one. That said, Na’Vi haven’t looked phenomenal so far hence they find themselves in this match-up and against marginally better opposition they may have found themselves in trouble.

If Karrigan can take Na’Vi out of their comfort-zone, throw in the new Inferno map that has rejoined the pool then we could see an upset – so if you fancy the one outsider bet today then FaZe offer value at 3.75 on Bet365. GuardiaN doesn’t look the player he used to, but with players of the calibre of Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev they should still walk past a bit-part FaZe clan. You can get ~1.30 at GG.Bet, Pinnacle or Unikrn on Na’Vi to win it.  

Esports Insider says: There’s disappointingly no ante-post to be found. Head to Betway if you want a few interesting markets with depth for these match-ups but they’re more a bit of fun (player kills in round 1 etc). There’s not a huge amount of value to be had here, as the first tournament after the Major tends to favour the teams that haven’t had huge shake-ups. Nonetheless, most of the above should be intriguing; even if there’s little value to be had in the gambling world.