On April 15, the second season of the DPC in the CIS starts – for most teams this is the last chance to get hooked on a direct ticket to The International. Now in the first division there are no teams assembled the day before the start, which means that the struggle for each position will be especially tense. Will they be able to Natus Vincere prove in fact that the replacement is justified GeneRaL? Why Virtus.pro after the failure at the Major, is still the undoubted favorite in the CIS? And what to expect from the newcomers in the first division? The answers to these questions are in the material Cybersport.ru.
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Virtus.pro is in a hurry to rehabilitate itself for failure at the Major
The eighth place in the Major is an excellent cold shower for the team, which the entire community wore for six months. It is difficult to write off the performance of the Save-team as excitement due to the LAN tournament. Firstly, some of the roster participants already had experience of playing on stage, and secondly, the Major in Singapore, which took place in front of empty stands, cannot be called a full-fledged LAN. Virtus.pro’s problems were of a play nature. Domination in their region and successful experience of meetings with European teams gave the CIS team (and the fans) a false sense of superiority. However, as we saw in Singapore, what can be used to beat Team Unique or NoTechies, it just doesn’t work against PSG.LGD.
Virtus.pro
It’s good that this understanding came to the team at the first Major of the season, and not at The International, which Virtus.pro will undoubtedly get to. Now the team had to go through a wave of hate in the comments, a flurry of criticism from analysts and, for sure, a serious conversation with the club’s management. And this is great, because in the second season we have to face an updated and very angry Virtus.pro. After failures with Enchantress and Bounty Hunter in the Major, VP is unlikely to swagger with the outsiders of the division, as before, picking the forest Huskar. Now the team will work with an eye on the Major, realizing that it is still far from the top 1 in the world.
Therefore, there is a great chance that the intrigue in the second season will be even less than in the first. Virtus.pro previously easily “moved” other teams from the CIS, now the team must destroy opponents more seriously and confidently. In addition, VP players, given how much time they devote to training and matchmaking, should adapt to the new patch faster than others. Nightfallfor example, will be happy to return to the Faceless Void meta, which he shone in at the EPIC League. BUT DM will finally be able to return to the signature Magnus, on which he does much better than on Mars. Bookmakers also have no doubt that Virtus.pro will be the favorite of the second season and will deal with AS Monaco Gambit without any problems in the first match.
Odds: Virtus.pro (1.40) – AS Monaco Gambit (2.80)
NAVI after the storm
Surely the first NAVI match in the second season will become the most popular in the entire tournament in the CIS. The broadcast will bring together all fans and haters (the number of the latter has probably increased slightly) who will want to get an answer to the question: “Is it better RAMZES666than GeneRaL? ” I don’t want to mess around with the twists and turns of this transfer, which has become the loudest in the CIS over the past year – it is much more interesting to ponder what it will lead NAVI to in the second season. The members of the squad unanimously spoke about internal problems with the atmosphere and extremely weak play lately. In such a situation, a replacement can really refresh the team, but RAMZES666 is unlikely to be able to fix everything at once.
RAMZES666
On paper, the NAVI roster still looks very strong, but the loss of self-confidence and the emerging tension within the team can negatively affect the results over a long distance. However, a team can start quite cheerfully – this can be facilitated by sports anger and a desire to prove to the whole community that they are right against the background of criticism on social networks after the exclusion of GeneRaL. However, any noticeable failure can knock NAVI off track again, given the emotional state of the team in recent months. Probably, RAMZES666 will be able to take on the role of an in-game leader, which will increase the tactical variability and efficiency of team interactions, but solving problems outside of Dota 2 is not his forte. Namely, the team needs to do something with this, because neither the coach nor the captain of NAVI clearly could cope with it.
In addition, in the first season, the rivals were weaker, because some of the teams gathered right before the start of the DPC, and the two main competitors of NAVI for the second slot were Team Spirit and AS Monaco Gambit – made replacements already during the tournament. Now the RAMZES666 team will have to deal with the already established stacks, so no pass matches are expected.
In the first match, NAVI will face Team Spirit, which has proven itself well during the first season. And most importantly, the team Miposhka has already gained momentum: while NAVI players were solving problems with the roster and responding to fans on social networks, Team Spirit became the winner of the Dota 2 Champions League 2023 and took second place at EPIC League Season 3. Against the backdrop of a series of clanvars lost to NAVI, Spirit’s results look really impressive, and after all, it is very important for the RAMZES666 team to start the season with a victory. However, bookmakers are confident in the success of NAVI and consider them a favorite in the match against Team Spirit.
Odds: NAVI (1.55) – Team Spirit (2.35)
AS Monaco Gambit time to live up to ambition
At the end of the first season, players AS Monaco Gambit stated that if No.[o]ne was with the team from the very start of the tournament, then it could have taken second place, ahead of NAVI. This statement caused a great resonance in the community, but one cannot argue with the fact that the roster really got prettier under Minenko. Yes, and No[o]ne gradually regained its former shape with each match. At the AS Monaco Major, Gambit was unable to advance to the group stage, although it was as close as possible to this – the team lost to Team Liquid in a replay for the last slot. However, the CIS squad showed a decent performance in the match with the Chinese teams. According to some fans, the team even looked more prepared than Virtus.pro.
AS Monaco Gambit
The only thing that should alarm AS Monaco Gambit fans is the failed transition No[o]ne in NAVI. When Minenko just joined the team, he announced that he would perform until the end of the first season, and then make a final decision. According to No[o]ne, he was going to see how the teammates behave on the LAN. As we know, immediately after the Major in Singapore, Minenko announced his search for a team, which means that he saw some problems in the team or at least considered its prospects insufficient in comparison with the same NAVI. Of course, we will not recognize the interior kitchen of AS Monaco Gambit, but from the outside it all looks like a wake-up call.
In any case, AS Monaco Gambit both at the end of last season and at the Major looked quite a fighting team, but now one cannot make allowances for non-play or adaptation of No[o]ne to the team. Now Gambit must give results and show that it is able to bypass NAVI at a distance and even compete with Virtus.pro. If ASM.Gambit remains a promising contender for third place in the second season, then the roster will obviously not live long. It will be difficult to start the season with a victory, because the first rival of the team will be Virtus.pro. And then AS Monaco Gambit will meet with NAVI, and in this fight the bookmakers also do not believe in the success of the No[o]ne.
Odds: AS Monaco Gambit (2.08) – NAVI (1.70)
What to expect from PuckChamp and Winstrike?
Two young teams advanced from the second division to the first – PuckChamp and Winstrike Team… In their league, they are ahead of the more eminent in composition. XactJlepbI, HellRaisers and Gambit-2… However, the level of the first and second divisions is still significantly different, and therefore it is clearly not worth expecting that PuckChamp or Winstrike will be able to play on equal terms with NAVI and VP. At the recent EPIC League Season 3, both teams performed rather average: PuckChamp could not get into the first division, but became the champion of the second, and Winstrike, having earned a slot in the major league, took only eighth place.
ArtStyle Becomes PuckChamp Trainer
As part of EPIC League Season 3, both teams showed that they are ready to fight with the outsiders of the first DPC division – with EXTREMUM and Team Unique. Perhaps the teams will take one card away from the conditional AS Monaco Gambit or Team Spirit, but they will not be able to claim more. Of the strengths of PuckChamp, it is worth highlighting the rather rapid progress of the team (perhaps next season it will be able to seriously claim more) and the arrival of ArtStyle to the position of a coach. In Winstrike, he shows himself very well as a carry dyrachyo, and the experience of the team is added by a 30-year veteran of the scene chshrct…
Bookmakers believe in the potential of newcomers and consider them to be favorites in matches with EXTREMUM and Team Unique.
Odds:
- Winstrike (1.45) – EXTREMUM (2.62);
- PuckChamp (1.50) – Team Unique (2.48).
