The International 2019: Groups Analysis and Predictions

Twenty-four hours before The International 2019 group stage was set to begin. With light and scene check going on at the Mercedes-Benz Arena in Shanghai, the organizers finally announced the long awaited round-robin groups. In less than twelve hours the battle for the winner bracket commences. This gives us just enough time to overview both groups drawn, the favorites and likely winners of all twenty matches on Day 1.

• Let’s have some fun: how would a perfect TI9 Fantasy Team look like?

In terms of balance, TI 2019 features one of the most balanced groups to date. Group A features DPC point leader Team Secret while 2nd through 4th placed Virtus.Pro and Vici Gaming and Evil Geniuses are all in Group B. As per the rules of the Group Stage, out of the nine teams in each group, four teams advance to the winner bracket and four to the loser with one team eliminated in each group. With this in mind, let’s take a look at the likely placement in each group after the group stage finishes.

Group A has four clear cut favorites for advancing to the Winner Bracket. Teams Secret, Liquid, TNC Predator and PSG.LGD should all make it out of groups and take the 1-4th spot. The fifth to eight spot should fall to Alliance, Chaos Esports Club and Keen Gaming, while the team eliminated is a toss-up between Mineski and Newbee.

Group B is a bit more complex in terms of predictions. While Virtus.Pro and Vici Gaming will most likely battle for the first and second spot in the group, the following spots 3rd to 6th are a tossup between OG, EG, Fnatic and NiP. Two out of the four will have settle for advancement to the loser bracket together with NaVi and RNG. The short straw and elimination in Group B falls to Infamous.

Match predictions

Day 1 is set to begin at 3:00am CEST and feature twenty best-of-two matches involving all 18 teams. Winning both games nets 2 points while a draw awards 1 point to each team. With this in mind let us put our prediction hat on and “guess” the likely outcome in all twenty matches.

Our TI9 predictions and analysis came out with 10 draws and 10 victories out of all the matchups in Day 1. Team Secret and Team Liquid will have our pick for “Match of the Day” at 13:00 PM.

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