IEM Rio 2023 CS:GO betting picks & odds – April 17, 2023

From Monday, 16 of the top Counter-Strike teams will gather in Rio de Janeiro for IEM Spring, also known as IEM Rio, to compete for a US$250,000 prize pool. The first round of matches will be best-of-one series, with four games played on April 17 in each group. Below are our best bets for Monday’s IEM Rio games, along with odds from the best esports betting sites.

The first series at IEM Rio will feature world no.22 Ninjas in Pyjamas and world no.28 Imperial, both of whom had underwhelming performances at their respective regional BLAST.tv Paris Major RMRs. Over the last two weeks, NiP have won four of their last nine series, with two of those losses coming in best-of-one series. While Imperial have won four of their last six series, including first place at the BLAST Premier Spring Showdown Americas, they recently failed to qualify for the Paris Major. With both teams similarly placed in the ESL world rankings, we anticipate a close contest.

The second series will pit world no.27 TheMongolz against world no.4 Natus Vincere, who are expected to win with relative ease as overwhelming favourites with CS:GO betting sites. Over the last month, the all-Mongolian roster has dominated the Asian region, qualifying for the Paris Major last weekend. While NaVi qualified for the Paris Major after a strong performance at ESL Pro League Season 17, they were knocked out in the semifinals by FaZe Clan to finish third-fourth. TheMongolz lack the firepower to compete with a powerhouse like NaVi, and we expect the world no.4 to win easily.

The third series of the day will pit world no.19 BIG against world no.10 MOUZ. These two teams met at the IEM Rio Major late last year, with BIG winning 16-7. BIG finished second in the BLAST Premier Spring Showdown Europe, losing 1-2 to Cloud9 in the grand final. MOUZ’s international roster finished fifth-eighth at ESL Pro League 17 in late March, qualifying for the Paris Major Challengers Stage last week. BIG have a strong recent record in best-of-one series, whereas MOUZ do not, so we’ll take the underdog at the round handicap.

Heroic and 9INE will compete in the first round of IEM Rio after being the first two teams to qualify for the Paris Major out of the Europe RMR B earlier this week. The Danish squad will be heavy favourites. Heroic, the world no.3, will be the second-ranked roster in Rio, with only FaZe Clan ranked higher. 9INE enter this event as the world no.35, but they are in excellent form, having defeated G2 Esports, BIG, and Team Vitality at the Paris Major RMR. This could be one of the better series of the first round.

Team Vitality and OG enter their first-round matches with recent meetings going either way, with Vitality winning 2-0 at ESL Pro League 17 and OG winning 2-0 at the 2022 BLAST Premier World Final. As no.6 in the world, it’s easy to see why Team Vitality are heavy favourites in this match. They dominated their last two matches, winning 16-5 and 16-9. We’re going with Vitality to win this series with a round handicap of -4.5.

MIBR will open their home tournament in Rio with a big match against world no.5 Cloud9, with the Russian-based organisation coming into IEM Rio on the back of some strong performances in their last four events. Cloud9 won the BLAST Premier Spring Showdown Europe and the BetBoom Playlist Urbanistic, as well as the ESL Pro League 17 and the IEM Dallas Europe Closed Qualifier. Many Brazilian fans will be hoping that MIBR or FURIA can go far in this event, but we don’t expect MIBR to win the first round.

World no.11 FURIA will open their IEM Rio campaign against world no.12 Fnatic, with this best-of-one series expected to be one of the closest on day one. In the first round of the ESL Pro League playoffs, FURIA defeated Fnatic 2-0 (16-13, 16-13) in their only meeting of the tournament. Both teams have qualified for the BLAST.tv Paris Major in the last week and will enter this match full of confidence.

The final match of the day will pit the highest-ranked team, FaZe Clan, against the lowest-ranked team, 9z, with the world no.2 starting as the day’s shortest favourite with Counter-Strike betting sites. We have no doubt that FaZe will win this series – the only question is by how many rounds.

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