First Round Matchups Drawn for New Legends Stage at FACEIT London Major
First round matchups for the New Legends Stage at the FACEIT London Major have been drawn, following the New Challengers Stage which saw some big names fall out of contention.
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The FACEIT London Major is the second major of 2018, after Cloud9 historically won ELEAGUE Boston in January, but the landscape of Counter-Strike has changed significantly since then.
The main qualifiers for the London Major take place in two stages: New Challengers and New Legends, before the final stage, New Champions.
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Eight casualties have fallen in the New Challengers stage; North, Team Spirit, OpTic Gaming, Gambit, Rogue, Renegades, Space Soldiers and Virtus.Pro.
That leaves the top eight teams to advance, with upsets earning unlikely hopefuls such as TyLoo, Vega Squadron and compLexity a place in the New Legends stage.
Teams were drawn from five separate pools, with Legends teams matching up exclusively with teams qualifying from New Challengers.
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New Legends Stage, First Round Matchups
- Cloud9 vs Vega Squadron
- Made in Brazil vs TyLoo
- FaZe Clan vs BIG Clan
- Natus Vincere vs Astralis
- G2 Esports vs Hellraisers
- fnatic vs compLexity
- Winstrike vs Team Liquid
- mousesports vs Ninjas in Pyjamas
Na’Vi will know they have likely the toughest draw here, with Astralis coming in as arguably the most in form team, but with the likes of s1mple and electronic, there is no counting out the Ukrainians.
FaZe Clan’s match up against BIG should go in their favor, but BIG have proved themselves a banana skin team of sorts, especially with their memorable run at ESL One Cologne, where they caused a string of upsets to make the grand final.
One of the harder matches to predict will be mousesports vs NiP, with a finely poised series waiting there. Cloud9 have had their struggles of late, but surely they can overcome Vega? The same goes for MiBR, who despite their patchy form, should have enough talent to see past Chinese hopefuls TyLoo.
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The New Legends stage will begin on September 12, and last until September 16, with five rounds of matches to be played.
Rounds one to four will be best of 1 matches, shifting to best of 3’s for round five. Again another eight teams will advance, to play at the SSE Arena, Wembley, to decide the FACEIT Major 2018 champions.
