ECS Season 8 Finals - MIBR and Sharks preview

What is the Esports Championship Series (ECS) Season 8 Finals?

The Esports Championship Series, also known as ECS, begins its eighth season this autumn 2019. ECS8 is split into two regions, North America and Europe. After five weeks of competition, eight teams, four from Europe and four from North America, have secured places at the Dallas Finals.

There, they’ll compete for a share of $500,000 and to be the winners of the ECS Season 8 Finals where the winner will take home $225,000. The finals will start off in a GSL-style Group Stage, where the top two teams will move onto the best-of-three single-elimination bracket.

ECS Season 8 Finals Odds

The odds below represent the opening matches for the ECS Season 8 Finals. For a complete list of odds for ECS 8, head over to our CS:GO section.

MIBR vs. Sharks: Battle for Brazil

For the second ECS Finals in a row, two Brazilian squads are set to attend. In Dallas, MIBR will be making a return and will line up alongside the relatively unknowns Sharks. As with last season, MIBR clinched qualification in the final week, whereas newcomers Sharks picked up a Dallas spot after the opening two.

Most will already know MIBR, a team with a strong foothold at the top of CS:GO having attended and won numerous events over the past few years. Since the Major, they have attended StarSeries i-League Season 8, ESL Pro League Season 10 Group Stages, V4 Future Sports Festival and BLAST Pro Series: Moscow.

Sharks are likely to be less well-known outside of Brazil. Since the Major, they have only taken part in event qualifiers, the two opening ECS weeks and the Latin American group stage of the ESL Pro League. In fact, they have only appeared offline three times this year – DreamHack Open Rio in April, the XF Braga Cup in May and the Berlin Americas Minor in July.

This comparison will be important, as both MIBR and Sharks have been drawn into ECS Group B, alongside Astralis and Fnatic. While they’re not playing in the opening round, there’s a good chance that either team will play against the other later in that group stage.

MIBR: Veteran fer and newcomer kNgV-

MIBR have a whole host of players to look to for the upcoming ECS Finals, but for the purposes of this article we’ll focus on two potential leaders. The first player is one of the two mainstays of the historical MIBR roster, Fernando “fer” Alvarenga. fer has played alongside team captain Gabriel “FalleN” Toledo in every iteration of the MIBR roster since they were with KaBuM in 2014.

fer has historically been one of the MIBR squad’s strongest riflers, but has always tended to be hidden behind Marcelo “coldzera” David’s shadow. With coldzera having moved on to FaZe, fer takes his place as the man to watch - and become the consistent leading star.

meyern's last international apperance saw him secure a 1.14 rating in a 2-1 loss to Renegades. This included a 1.50 rating on Dust2.

In the time since the Berlin major, fer has been the team’s leading star. Holding a 1.14 rating from HLTV, he has helped MIBR to playoff finishes at StarSeries i-League Season 8 and V5 Future Sports Festival, and narrowly missed out on the BLAST Pro Series Moscow final. Sticking mostly to the AK-47, and holding an entry fragger-esque role, MIBR will be relying on him to open bombsites and areas of the map quickly to get a hold on the series.

New man Vito “kNgV-” Giuseppe is MIBR’s other player with star potential. In rating terms, he’s just behind fer on a 1.12, however he holds a 1.20 K/D ratio. It was kNgV- who pushed MIBR to the top of their ESL Pro League group, racking up a 1.27 rating in the process. It was only after false starts at BLAST Pro Series Moscow and the V4 Future Sports Festival that kNgV- got into his groove.

kNgV- is predominantly an AWPer, and has picked up the role on MIBR from IGL FalleN. For MIBR to have a successful game, kNgV- will need to hit flicks and effectively lock down positions of the map that he is placed on. On previous teams his role was used effectively, most notably back in 2017 when he helped spearhead Immortals to second place at the Krakow Major.

More recently, his AWPing talents were on show during the ESL Pro League Season 10 Group Stage, where he was MIBR’s leading player with a 1.27 average rating, and averaged 0.83 kills per round. He was equally as pivotal in the final ECS Season 8 week, hitting a 1.31 average rating with an average 0.85 kills per round. If kNgV-‘s performance keeps trending upwards and can hit similar numbers come Dallas, MIBR could be a very dangerous team and a serious contender for the title.

Sharks: All eyes on meyern

While MIBR has a host of players to potentially look out for, for the past few months Sharks has only really had one player making people talk. Argentinian youngster Ignacio “meyern” Meyer, who joined the team in August, has been the main fragging outlet for Sharks. Holding a 1.27 HLTV rating, which is .14 ahead of the team’s next strongest player, he has been pivotal to Sharks recent successes in North America.

kNgV- is predominantly an AWPer. For MIBR to have a successful game, kNgV- will need to hit flicks and effectively lock down positions of the map that he is placed on.

meyern joined the team just before the Pinnacle Cup qualifiers for this season of ECS, and helped his team not only secure a place in the season, but also qualify for a Latin American ESL Pro League spot. After qualifying for those events, he remained the team’s highest performer hitting a 1.32 rating in the ESL Pro League and a 1.09 and 1.14 rating in the first two respective weeks of ECS, from which Sharks qualified from. Ignoring the final game of the opening week, a heavy 2-0 loss to NRG, meyern was sitting on a 1.25 rating after Sharks’ opening wins.

While team quality hasn’t necessarily been as high as the upcoming ECS Finals, this will not be the first time meyern has taken part in a top level international tournament. His last appearance came when he was on the all-Argentinian Isurus at DreamHack Masters Dallas in May. Despite his team being knocked out in last place, meyern proved himself against Renegades with a 1.14 rating over the 2-1 series loss, holding 89.7 in Average Damage per Round (ADR). His strongest performance came on Dust2, where the then-16 year old hit 106.8 in ADR for a 1.50 rating.

If meyern is able to secure a similar rating this time out in Dallas, backed up by strong players like Raphael “exit” Lacerda and compatriot Luca “Luken” Nadotti, and Sharks are able to secure a favourable map selection, they could cause some upsets. This is especially possible considering the fact the opening match is a best-of-one, so if Astralis get caught short and don’t respect their opponents, the Danes could come into a world of pain.

The ECS Season 8 Finals start on November 28, and continue until December 2. All the action in the $125,000 event can be found in English on the FACEIT Twitch channel, or in Brazilian Portuguese on Beyond the Summit. Sharks and MIBR are in Group B, and are set to play Astralis and Fnatic respectively in their opening matches.

* Odds subject to change.