Team Liquid survive group D of ESL Pro League Season 16

The final group of ESL Pro League Season 16 is over and all of the favorites advanced to the playoffs. However, Team Liquid got very close to being eliminated. Their defeats against FURIA Esports and Eternal Fire meant that if they hadn’t won the final match of the group against Cloud9, they would have been eliminated.

The big problem here was that Cloud9 had won their first four matches in the group. It seemed as though Liquid had no chance of winning against them in their current form. But somehow, the team’s IGL, Nicholas “nitr0” Cannella, managed to find Cloud9’s weaknesses.

On top of that, he also managed to patch enough holes in Liquid’s game to avoid getting completely destroyed by one of the strongest teams we’ve seen at this tournament. Let’s not forget that C9, prior to this match, had not lost a single map in four games. And they had won most of their maps at comfortable scores.

To go from that to losing against a team that had struggled in the first four matches is quite unusual. But it’s clear that C9 didn’t lose the match because of their own poorly planned strategies. Liquid simply won it thanks to excellent shot-calling and individual plays.

Group results

The complete results of group D of this CS:GO tournament look like this:

• Cloud9: 4 W – 1 L: +47
• FURIA Esports: 4 W – 1 L: +38
• Team Liquid: 3 W – 2 L: +12
• Evil Geniuses: 2 W – 3 L: -7
• Eternal Fire: 2 W – 3 L: -16
• Movistar Riders: 0 W – 5 L: -74

As it can be seen, Movistar Riders are no longer the team that finished 3rd–4th at IEM Cologne. That result was a fluke and we should all purge it from our minds. Otherwise we might regard Riders as one of the strong teams in tournaments like ESL Pro League Season 16. And they clearly aren’t, at least not for now.

Perhaps in 2023, if they make some inspired roster changes or start playing as well as they did at IEM Cologne 2022, Riders will become once more a team to be feared. But until then, it’s hard to take them seriously as an S-tier competitor. Their place is with the tier-2 teams that get invited to all sorts of A-tier and B-tier tournaments.

One team that proved to be much stronger than expected at this tournament was FURIA. They played really well and easily secured their playoffs ticket. The only opponent that managed to defeat them was Cloud9.

Header: Team Liquid