?MiBR stunned Natus Vincere (16-12) in the first round of Group B last Saturday, but since then, the Brazilians haven’t achieved much. They lost their next two bouts against OG (9-16) and Astralis (9-16), proving their victory against the current Major champions was nothing more than a fluke.

MiBR had a much tougher group to fight through, but even with two losses against G2 Esports (12-16) and BIG (10-16), Complexity are viewed as the favourites to win this bout. That makes sense – not because Complexity are very good, but rather because MiBR are arguably the weakest team at the tournament.

Still, at the offered CS:GO betting odds, you have to consider backing MiBR to show up and offer some form of resistance. We wouldn’t side with them to win, nor are MiBR a good bet with a 2.5-round advantage, but they should pick up at least 11 rounds.

?Natus Vincere looked unstoppable in the latter part of 2021, but they slipped early in Group A with back-to-back defeats against MiBR (12-16) and Astralis (17-19). Despite the CIS juggernauts’ struggles, Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev and his crew are heavy favourites to take down Team Liquid on Thursday.

Team Liquid got off to a very disappointing start to the 2022 season and lost two close games against FaZe Clan (15-19, 17-19) on Sunday. Regardless, Nicholas “nitr0” Cannella and co. played well in those outings, so you have to have some faith in them to put up a fight in the play-in stage.

At +374, Team Liquid’s implied probability of winning is only 21.1%, which is way too low. NaVi, while a much stronger team, have yet to shake off the rust, suggesting that there’s a chance we might see an upset. Liquid with a 4.5-round advantage is a safer bet, but you’ll find far more value with the North American side on the moneyline market.

?Evil Geniuses lost both Group C matches against Team Vitality (3-16) and Team Liquid (17-19), which isn’t great, but not that much worse than BIG. The German squad can have their moments, but they have yet to produce anything noteworthy with a 16-10 victory against Complexity and two defeats against Ninjas in Pyjamas (12-16, 9-16).

If we look at the individual performance numbers this tournament, all players on BIG, except for Nils “k1to” Gruhne, have a +1.00 performance rating. On the other side, William “RUSH” Wierzba (1.00) is the only player on EG with a positive rating. Still, EG have had to face much tougher teams, so they deserve some slack.

We favour BIG slightly for this bout, but not enough to bet on them at -200. As weak as Evil Geniuses have been, their odds should be much closer to even money. At +155, we have to back EG to take down the German squad.

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?As the latest CS:GO betting odds suggest, Natus Vincere should defeat MiBR convincingly, and we have no reason to argue with that. But this is still NaVi’s first official match since December 19, when they won BLAST Premier World Final 2021, so some ring rust is expected.

MiBR shouldn’t come even close to beating NaVi, and since the Brazilian squad will also miss Marcelo “chelo” Cespedes due to COVID, their chances to cause an upset are even slimmer. But that doesn’t mean MiBR can’t put up a fight and win at least a few rounds.

The esports betting sites offer +100 on MiBR with a +4.5 handicap in the first-half betting markets, which seems a bit too generous. Admittedly, NaVi should come out ahead with plenty of rounds to spare, but the long break, combined with the fact that NaVi will likely underestimate MiBR, could see the Brazilians collect at least six rounds.

?Astralis field one of the most stacked rosters in the European CS:GO scene, but the Danish esports organisation had this exact lineup since November, and yet they failed to achieve much. Most recently, Astralis attended Funspark ULTI 2021, where they lost to K23 (1-2) and Entropiq (1-2), which is hardly inspiring.

OG enter the 2022 season without their star in-game leader Aleksi “Aleksib” Virolainen, who swapped places with Nemanja “nexa” Isakovi?. We don’t know how this switch will work out, but it shouldn’t weaken OG.

Astralis are rightly the favourites for this match, but they don’t deserve to be priced at such odds. Value is with OG on the moneyline market.

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?G2 Esports enter the 2022 season with a new AWPer in Ilya “m0NESY” Osipov, a new in-game leader in Aleksi “Aleksib” Virolainen, and a new coach in Rémy “XTQZZZ” Quoniam, which forms a very scary roster that should continue where G2 left off last year. But with so many changes – and in such influential positions – it’s fair to ask whether G2 have had enough time to form a strong game plan and synergy.

Complexity are in a similar spot. The Texas-based organisation replaced its entire CS:GO esports roster by signing Michael “Grim” Wince from Team Liquid, Paytyn “junior” Johnson from FURIA, and the former Extra Salt trio in Johnny “JT” Theodosiou, Justin “FaNg” Coakley, and Ricky “floppy” Kemery.

Talent-wise, G2 Esports are miles ahead of Complexity and should be competing for Major titles this year. Still, while G2 have a very high ceiling, we don’t expect them to crush Complexity on Friday.

Ninjas in Pyjamas are without their star player and in-game leader Nicolai “dev1ce” Reedtz, who is out with an injury and won’t be able to help his side at the opening BLAST event of 2022. In his place, the Swedish CS:GO esports squad will field academy AWPer Love “phzy” Smidebrant.

Without dev1ce, NiP’s chances to make a deep run at BLAST Premier are slim to none, but they should do reasonably well against the German squad. BIG have made only one roster change this offseason, signing Josef “faveN” Baumann from Sprout to replace Nicklas “gade” Gade, who hasn’t delivered since his arrival in July.

On paper, faveN is quite an upgrade from gade, and he also comes into a German-speaking team that fields two of his former teammates in Florian “syrsoN” Rische and Nils “k1to” Gruhne, so he should fit in perfectly. The esports betting sites have BIG and NiP priced very close, which seems fair, but we prefer BIG in this matchup.

BIG to win at -116.28 is a decent bet, but we’ll take the Germans with a -1.5 handicap for a slight odds boost.

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