Nigma Galaxy vs Team Liquid Prediction: Team Liquid Should Work on Morals

ESL One Malaysia 2022 will be held August 23-28 in Genting Highlands, Malaysia. Twelve teams worldwide will compete for the championship title and a $400,000 prize pool. All group stage matches will be played in a bo2 format. Beginning with the playoffs, teams will fight in games to two victories. This is the last major tournament before the qualifiers for The International 11. Dota 2 fans have only to enjoy the great fun and the variety of teams.

On August 23, Nigma Galaxy vs Team Liquid will play their opening match in the group stage of ESL One Malaysia 2022. Which of the teams will be stronger? We will find out very soon. The meeting is scheduled to start at 14:40.

Nigma Galaxy (formerly known as Team Nigma) is a European eSports organization founded by former Team Liquid players and four of the five champions of The International 2017. After finishing second at The International 2019, captain KuroKy announced his departure from Team Liquid with the idea of starting his own organization. In the online era, this team was still more or less at the top of European Dota, but many problems surfaced when it came to qualifying for TI10. The difficulties came even earlier. Let us remember the majors in 2021 — Singapore failed (16th place) with zero group victories, and Kyiv was no less ugly in the game, but at least the team took the 5th-6th place. The quals for TI10 ended for them in third place.

In 2022 things went downhill for the team. Nigma Galaxy finished the winter tour in sixth place, in the spring in eighth, and as a result, the team was relegated to the second division. The culprit of the failure was found quickly - iLTW was kicked out of the team, and a week later, the organization announced the arrival of the legendary SumaiL.

The team went through the second division in the summer tour with flying colors, winning all seven battles, giving up one map only in the last, meaningless match. But is it possible to judge the team's strength by defeating teams from the second European division? We wouldn't say so. Motivation is much more important, and the Europeans shouldn't have any problems here.

Before ESL One Malaysia 2022, there was no major for Nigma Galaxy. We saw the SumaiL team at the Riyadh Masters 2022 in the UAE, where Nigma Galaxy made a good showing, making the playoffs but losing in the quarterfinals to PSG.LGD, who eventually won the tournament. There's plenty of motivation to win in Malaysia, but don't forget that TI11 qualifiers are just around the corner, so they should do their best.

This European team has been feverish at all international LANs this year. Team Liquid has performed well online in all the regional DPC leagues, but the two majors have been an obvious failure, finishing 9-12th twice. It was also a failure at Riyadh Masters 2022 in UAE, not getting out of the group and last place.

If we analyze the last American major, Team Liquid players beat only their opponents from Soniqs (2-0), which shows not a very good game form of this team. Plus, the Liquid has five draws with the Outsiders, OG, Thunder Awaken, Talon Esports, and RNG. The Europeans made it to the playoffs but lost straight away to BOOM Esports from Asia (1-2) in the lower bracket, which is no good on the eve of TI11. In fact, the Europeans have to qualify for this tournament, and they don't look like obvious favorites to win the only slot for the main event in Western Europe yet.

Team Liquid played well through Europe's entire 2021/22 DPC cycle. The team achieved the championship as part of the winter tourney, finishing second in the regional winter finals, where extra DPC points were drawn instead of the first canceled major. In the spring, Liquid finished third in the regional league and went to the major, where they performed mediocrely, placing 9-12. Due to the failure in the major, the European team had to try their best in the Summer Tour of the Regional League and Team Liquid managed to do this. The players became second, getting a ticket to the August major in the U.S., where another failure followed.

The European team played with a substitute at the Riyadh Masters 2022 Arabian Lancet tournament in late August. The great and mighty Ana replaced the Finnish carry MATUMBAMAN. Why the Finn didn't go to the UAE with the team is unknown. At ESL One Malaysia 2022, the team is in full strength, but have they worked on their mistakes?

In this match, we offer the following betting options: a draw, the frags TO (102.5), and the individual total 2 frags over (50.5).