Renegades IEM Sydney Title Hunt

The recently dominant Renegades aim to win their first Major event, IEM Sydney 2019, which will begin this Tuesday April 30th. 

We have seen a new contender rise in the last 3 months, with the Counter-Strike world being shocked with the recent performances from the prominently Australian lineup, boasting a recent Semi-Final achievement at StarSeries Season 7, being knocked out with a narrow 2-1 loss to Na’Vi.

This run of form can be attributed to a massive team improvement, but specifically to Rifler Justin ‘JKS’ Savage and AWP player Sean ‘Gratisfacton’ Kaiwai, who have shown their skills off with brilliant performances over the last 3 months, which has propelled Renegades into Top 5 in the world, according to HLTV’s Ranking. Their insane individual play has single-handedly given Renegades a major boost, knowing that they have the World-Class talent to rely on.

The recent ESL Pro League Group A saw some adversity for them, as Joakim ‘jkaem’ Myrbostad and Gratisfaction had VISA issues, resulting into the Renegades having to use two stand-ins on Day 1 vs eUnited, falling 2-0. The next 2 days saw the return of jkaem, which was followed by a deuce of wins over INTZ and NRG, with only 1 stand-in, being Owen ‘smooya’ Butterfield.

The Renegades, known by many as ‘The Boys’, aim to continue this tremendous run of form in the comfort of their own Nation, with their sights set on IEM Sydney.

Going up against the likes of North American and European juggernauts Liquid and FaZe, we can certainly agree that The Boys will have their work cut out for them. Giants like these are what the Australian crowd love, if Renegades were to take down a massive contender in front of the thousands of locals, their confidence will be through the roof, potentially similar to the ELEAGUE Boston Major, which saw an immortal Cloud9 take down FaZe and win the Major in front of their home fans.

KEY FACTORS

• The Crowd – Renegades have a massive advantage that very few teams have the privilege of; an immense amount of support. The constant cheering and chanting from the crowd will be an advantage to them, boosting their confidence and their desire to win. The only issue is, you need to get the crowd going. If The Boys fail to win rounds and get the crowd on their side, it can effectively kill the mood and demotivate the players, sending them down a negative spiral, which can lead to an underwhelming outcome
• Captain Courageous – Recently, Aaron ‘AZR’ Ward has welcomed the IGL role, showing he is capable to compete with the best while also controlling the Renegades, calling strats and managing their economy. If AZR continues his recent purple patch of form, it will take a lot of stress off the shoulders of the rest of the team, allowing them to play more aggressive, putting their aim to use.
• Are they really contenders? – This is their time to prove the doubters wrong. Will they answer the critics, or was there recent form a one-off? This will ultimately be decided on April 30th. If they can pull of a string of performances throughout the event, they can really start to show why they were in those Top 5 Rankings, and why they should be considered as some of the Worlds best.

  

   

We can catch them in action at the Qudos Bank Arena, in Sydney Olympic Park, on the 30th of April, or if you aren’t attending the LAN, catch them live at https://www.twitch.tv/esl_csgo.