IEM Dallas preview
IEM Dallas is set to begin barely 24 hours after the conclusion of PGL Astana. God, it’s a good thing we love Counter-Strike. This is a lot. Especially when it’s just a warm up for June’s main event.
At least the field for Dallas looks better - Vitality, MOUZ, and Falcons will all be in attendance. So too will FaZe, the first of their two events with s1mple, which we couldn’t be more excited about.
Do we expect the GOAT to turn around FaZe’s fortunes? Absolutely not. Are we anticipating toxicity between him and EliGE within three maps? Yes we are. Do we want that to happen? Yes we do.
Why? Because we’re bad people. Get over it.
Of course, there is a small part of us that hopes it all works out for FaZe over in Texas. We miss s1mple, it would be nice for this stint to be the catalyst for his return, we just have our doubts as to whether he can fix the clearly deep-rooted issues with FaZe.
We can’t believe we’re saying this, but we’re also looking forward to seeing more from FURIA. We were truly baffled when they announced the signings of YEKINDAR and molodoy, but the two new signings impressed in Kazakhstan and the Brazilian (ish) team look completely revitalised.
Their team is some weird, late-stage international meta bullshit, but we’re the bullshit specialists, so we’re big fans.
Falcons will also be an interesting prospect. After pushing Vitality close in their last two outings they’ve now actually had some time to practice, so it’s not out of the question that they’ll be able to leapfrog the World’s number one over in Dallas. MOUZ will also be looking to do the same, but we just have more faith in NiKo and m0NESY than we do xertioN and torzsi.
We also just still can’t believe that Brollan is a good IGL. It’s just not right.
It’s still going to take a lot for either team to actually topple Vitality, though. ropz and ZywOo are just too good, seeing them lifting the trophy just feels inevitable at this point. They’ll provide another banger BO5 final because they love CS as much as we do, but they’ll win it, and then they’ll go on and win the Major, too.