The FaceIT London Major is down to its last four teams. The teams will compete for a chance to win the major and establish themselves in the Counter-Strike Global Offensive history. The FaceIT London Major has a prize pool of $1 million. It is held at the SSE Arena, Wembley. Team Liquid play against Astralis in the second semifinal of the day. Here is a quick preview on both the teams and their chances at the Major.

Team Liquid – The North American hope

The North American squad has a possibility of winning the entire Major. They have the talent and the strategy required to defeat the top teams in London. But there are still so many flaws with this roster. They have a very high peak performance but they lack the consistency to remain a top tier team.

Team Liquid’s performance at this Major is not surprising, however, there are enough critics who doubt the team’s potential to ‘win the major’. After all, they are matched up against top tier teams and in the semifinals, they will play against the best team in the world.

The North American squad has a lot of raw talent. From the best player in North America [ Twistzz] to the experience in NAF and Stanislaw, this team has the right pieces necessary to make a top tier team. However, they have been far from consistent almost alternating between a group Stage exit and a Grand finals appearance.

At this Major, Team Liquid has looked really good. This is helped by Twistzz playing near his peak level. The team has excellent starts in most of their games, but they have had lots of trouble in finishing out matches.

Nitro

Nitro is considered the primary AWPer on this team. However, he is not a superstar performer like the Guardians and the Devices. His consistency with the AWP is fairly unstable, as we saw yesterday in their match against Hellraisers. Hellraisers even put NAF and TACO on the AWP at times. It probably was a decision that Nitro influenced because he was definitely not hitting all of his shots. At the top level, a missed shot could mean the difference between a win or a loss in the round.

Nitro needs to be more consistent and improve his performance with the AWP. The role of the AWPer is crucial to the final outcome of a match. Nitro simply isn’t at the top level when it comes to his AWPing. He is a decent AWPer but nothing that inspires awe.

Astralis – The team to beat

The Danish roster is obviously the strongest team in the world. Their synergy and consistency with their performance are exactly what makes them one of the best teams in the world. Astralis have a great CT side wherein, they have excellent grenade usage and always seek more information.

Astralis often end up being extremely aggressive on one part of the map in order to gain information. This is not without caution as they almost always have a backup with their aggressive player. With their better aim, they are often able to either gain information or ensure that this part of the map is free.

Nicolai “dev1ce” Reedtz has been in contention for the title of the World’s best player for almost 4-5 years now. His consistency with the AWP, rifle as well as pistols makes him one of the best players in the world. His practice regimen involved retracing his steps in order to ensure that other teams cannot counter him. This is the level of practice and self-discipline that goes into Device becoming the beast that he is.

But it is Lukas “gla1ve” Rossander that has truly helped this team become the world’s best team. The In-Game Leader has some amazing mid-round calls. He ensures that the team is always on one page and they can, therefore, secure an advantage based on their strengths and numbers.

The In-Game Leadership is the X-Factor on Astralis

For Astralis, it has never been about their individual skill level or their ability to match up against the best teams in the world. But they have seemingly had problems with their In-Game Leadership. With Lukas “gla1ve” Rossander, the team has been way more consistent and precise in their mid-round calls. Astralis is one of the scariest teams when it comes to their mid-round calls and grenade usage. As the analysts showed in yesterday’s segment, Astralis is very good at shutting down one section of the map with only their grenades. This allows them to focus on other sections of the map and have a presence in numbers, especially on the CT Side.

Team Liquid require all of their players to perform

Team Liquid has the raw talent on their roster. On their good day, this team can win all their duels and emerge victoriously. What they do lack is the firepower especially when compared to Astralis.Team Liquid will need the performance of a lifetime if they are to win their match against Astralis. They are the underdogs in almost all aspects of this game. They don’t have the team chemistry, they lack a god like AWPer, they lack the individual skill of the AStralis players. Team liquid also falls behind in the Map Pool compared to Astralis.

Astralis is heavily favoured to win this match. They are the world’s best team and have a clinical precision when it comes to their T side. For them, winning a match is mostly business as usual. It is rare to see them get excited about winning a match, simply because of how regular it has become for them to win a map.

In addition to this, Astralis has a huge map pool. They are way better than Team liquid on almost all maps. While they have recently started vetoing Cache, we have seen Astralis play Cache to a very high level of efficiency. For now, we don’t know how well they are on all the maps because they have not really faced a severe test so far at the London FaceIT Major.

You can catch the action between Astralis and Team Liquid live on Twitch at 20:45 CEST.