Predictions for day two were the same across the board and there was only one surprise: Bunny losing to Starbuck; the Danish player was unable to adjust to the Slovenians strategy even though it was roaches roaches roaches every single game--not to take anything away from the Zerg player who returns to Premier after a one-season absence. That upset put me (and everyone) at 4-1 on the day. Onto the odds and predictions for the final day of Challenger:
Elazer vs Welmu - Aligulac gives the edge to the Finn (55%) and TL likes him as well; the Protoss player seems to have shaken off some of his issues in PvZ as he's had a recent string of victories over TLO, Snute, and TargA; that said, he's not unbeatable and the Polish player recently beat ShoWTimE--still, I'll stick with the odds here
GunGFuBanDa vs DnS - the German is an overwhelming favourite (80%; TL likes him too); unless your name is ShoWTimE the favoured Protoss hasn't lost a PvP series since March, so sticking with the odds is easy; I wonder if DnS will wind up being one of those Protoss players who appears once in Challenger briefly and then vanishes (ala PsiOniC, Majestic, etc)
Harstem vs Nerchio - everyone is still waiting for the Year of Harstem to occur, while the good times for the Polish Zerg drift further and further away as WOL fades into the past; Aligulac gives the Polish player an edge (58%; it was 55%); in the three series they've played in HOTS Nerchio has won two of them, but Harstem beat him 2-0 most recently and TL see's him winning; the Dutch player has been a little stronger in the match-up recently (19-3 vs 19-6) and there's nothing that stands out suggesting a win for the Zerg--this really could go either way, but I'll go with TL and the upset
FireCake vs Zanster - the odds make this a virtual coin flip (50% for the French Zerg, who TL likes as well); the Swede holds a very slight edge against his opponent (4-3), but lost when it mattered in their prior meeting in Challenger last season; FireCake hasn't lost a ZvZ since dropping a series to Stephano back in 2014; the Swede is also an excellent ZvZ player, with almost as dominant a record since losing to his opponent in April (16-2); I'd like to think after their last match Zanster has figured something out and I'll go with the upset here
Aligulac and TL agree on Welmu, GunGFuBanDa, and FireCake; I share TL's "upset" with Harstem as well as one of my own with the Swedish hope in Zanster. Hopefully we'll get matches that are a bit more competitive than day two (so more like day one).
This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)
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