PSG.LGD vs Team Spirit Prediction: The first face-to-face duel since the TI10 final

On Thursday, July 21, the second game day of the international Dota 2 tournament will be played in the UAE, where an impressive prize pool of $4,000,000 is up for grabs. TI10 finalists PSG LGD and Team Spirit will play in one of the first wave matches of the second game day.

Riyadh Masters 2022 is a Dota 2 LAN tournament that will take place July 20-24, 2022. The top ten teams from around the world will compete for $4,000,000. In addition to the cash prizes, the teams will have an international show of strength before the U.S. majors start in early August.

PSG LGD: The Chinese team is fundamental to win

There's not much to say about the strength of PSG LGD. This Chinese team will be considered the main favorite in all tournaments in which they decide to participate. This tournament on Arab soil can be considered a preparatory tournament. First of all, this is the first time since TI10 that Chinese teams are participating in international battles. Second, the PSG LGD players should be on their best form before the Majors, because they played the Summer Regional League with their hands down, even refusing to play one of the replay matches. Why can they afford it? They're in the majors, and most importantly, they got a ticket to TI11 a long time ago.

The PSG LGD team missed the first game day of the Riyadh Masters 2022 tournament, so the game with Team Spirit will be a debut for the Chinese. There is no need to remind us that it was the CIS team that defeated Team xiao8 in the TI10 final, so this fight is fundamental for PSG LGD.

In my opinion, PSG LGD is now the most stable team in the world if it is motivated. It is worth realizing that the xiao8’s team won the first and second DPC league in China and both regional finals that Valve organized for the Chinese region instead of the majors. During the summer tour, the team allowed itself to relax, because the main task was accomplished ahead of schedule. Even without going to the last match of the replay, the xiao8’s team explained this by the fact that the team wants to focus on preparing for international starts, and here is one of them.

The composition of this team is unchanged for many years and the main intrigue in the upcoming summer international tournaments is how many times PSG LGD will allow someone to beat them if anyone is capable of it now.

Team Spirit: Trying to prove their mettle

Team Spirit warmed up on Deboosters on the first game day, but this match is not indicative. PSG LGD is not a principal opponent for the Spirits, but it will be nice to repeat the success of the TI10 final, because the Chinese are unlikely to play with them relaxed, so the success in this match will show the main thing - Team Spirit continues to be the world leader.

Team Spirit should not be fooling around at this tournament. The TI10 champions are not exactly in top form right now, and there's no better place for them to be than here. The strongest team in the world was only in January and February, where in the CIS league they were simply tearing everyone apart. The first problems came during the spring tour. But let's face it, the world situation had a strong effect on the team, and the regional league held in a hurry was mostly overcome and Team Spirit went to the majors in Sweden.

But at the first international event of the year, the Spirits failed. The 9-12th place was really deserved, because what the CIS team demonstrated at that tournament was a collapse, which was emphasized by the players themselves, promising not to make such mistakes in the summer. It is noteworthy that the winner of TI10 has not yet been guaranteed a place in the next International, so the upcoming major is extremely important for Spirits.

And the players of Team Spirit were selected for the second major from the third lane of the summer regional league, where they lost in the replay first to VP, and then to NaVi. The game of this team continues to be very unstable, so it is important for the guys to improve it right in the UAE, so as not to get another failure in the Majors, a ticket to the TI10 quals and not get inadvertently knocked out by some Mind Games.

History of head-to-head encounters

Team Spirit has never defeated PSG LGD, except for the fateful TI10 final.

Expert Betting Tips

PSG LGD team will win the match. It is principled and important, and the team is stronger now, the repetition of the final of TI10 should not be expected. The odds for this are 2.40.

On the first map, the Chinese team will win with a handicap (-8.5) frags for 1.92.

On the second map, I will risk betting on Total Over 47.5 frags for 1.80.