The Fifth Intel Extreme Masters (IEM) is about to commence and will host the best teams the world in what is considered the World Championships of Counter-Strike 1.6.

The event is being covered by HLTV.org with continuous updates of broadcasting information via HLTV and internet-stream. Similarly to WCG, the stage matches will not be broadcasted via HLTV but instead hosted by ESL-TV stream which can be found here: http://tv.esl.eu/de/esltv_stream/

Group B's matches will be played tonight, commencing at approximately 7:00pm EST (Sydney/Melbourne time). Group A will be played tomorrow.

For more information regarding matches, HLTV I.P. addresses and tournament details head on over to www.HLTV.org

Group B - Predictions

Group B

Na`Vi - 1st

Lions - 2nd

fnatic - 3rd

Evil Geniuses - 4th

SK Gaming - 5th

redCode - 6th

Group B is considered the 'group of death' relative to Group A. It is stacked with high-tier teams, high-tier players and has left everyone wondering how the groups will unfold. In IEM5, the team that comes first will advance to play-offs automatically. In similar fashion to the Dice Nationals 2010, teams who come 2nd and 3rd in each group will join to the counter group and form a 4-team relegation playoffs.

I expect Group B to have a lot of draws and close matches, with no confident winner at the top of the bracket which should leave very interesting finals for everyone to watch.

NAVI - Predicted 1st

Na`Vi still hold the exact same line-up as they did when they won the IEM4 World Championship in 2010, exactly one year ago.

Prior to this world championship, Na`Vi placed fourth at the IEM European Championship. However, it is no secret that they are a team which heavily relies on strategic play to win them games. And it's also no secret that they do not use their primary tactics in the group stages of the tournament in order to avoid being counter-stratted.

With ‘Edward’ as the world’s best pistol player, I see them coming first in the group for the simple fact that the pistol round is perhaps going to be the biggest deciding factor as to whether or not teams will win the match or not.

In past tournaments, ‘markeloff’ has not used his AWP in the group stages in order to disallow teams the chance to counter his lines. As most experienced Counter-Strike players will tell you, you are essentially useless if the other team knows that a certain player has an AWP and where he is using it. I recommend every in-game caller to observe Na`Vi because they have a high level of team-work which they use to pummel even the best of teams.

Although I see Na`Vi doing very well in groups, I don’t believe they will repeat 2010 and win this tournament. They came out of nowhere, and dominated everyone in 2010. But now, their presence is noticed and there’s inside word that all their demos from the past four months have been watched by many teams. You can only ‘cover up’ so much of your primary gameplay in-game and I think that the element of surprise is lost its polish for Na`Vi.

LIONS - Predicted 2nd

I have put LIONS to come second for the simple fact that they drew to fnatic (the tournament winners) at the IEM European Championship just a month ago, and managed to play very well against Na`Vi.

LIONS are the same team that played against Immunity overseas, and while they may appear to be just a second-tier Swedish organisation, their results have been tremendously improving with every major tournament they attend.

With players like ‘threat’ and ‘Gux’, I am expecting Lions to do very well. As most people with a Dream Team on HLTV.org would know, picking Group B is very tough and there’s no general consensus for any team to progress except that Na`Vi should make it through.

The thing that I like most about Lions is that they have no major international superstars on their team. I’ve seen a couple of demos of them, and they play a very stable game of Counter-Strike and have great team work. They’re a great team to learn from as compared to somebody like GeT_RiGhT or f0rest because those two have an unnaturally high level of aim and movement which is impossible to replicate in-game.

The only downside to Lions is that Fnatic and SK are aware of the Lions team and how they play because they’ve been around for years. Other teams, however, are not. Lions will be a fun team to watch.

Group A Predictions

Group B's matches will be played tonight, commencing at approximately 7:00pm EST (Sydney/Melbourne time). Group A will be played tomorrow.

Group B - Predictions

Group A

mTw - 1st

Frag eXecutors - 2nd

compLexity - 3rd

Moscow Five - 4th

TCM-Gaming - 5th

UMX - 6th

Group A will be played on Wednesday, and is a lot easier to predict than Group B. We have two teams which are clearly on top, followed very closely by complexity (who wouldn't surprise me if they manage to come 1st or 2nd in this group, actually).

mTw - Predicted 1st

MTW want to return to their former glory days of 2008 but with many new professional organisations on the rise, they have only managed to creep into finals and somehow let it slip away.

Last month, in the IEM European Championship Final, they played Fnatic in the grand final which was a best of 3. mTw won the first map in an easy fashion. They looked like the certain winners, especially since Fnatic had a brand new team. On the next map, de_train, fnatic were down 11-4 at half. They came back to draw the next half, and take it into two overtimes. With amazing play by Delpan and Xizt, fnatic downed mTw on the second map. The third map was on de_inferno, and fnatic were able to crush them.

So close, yet so far for mTw.

mTw’s ‘trace’ will surely have to pull some big numbers once they progress the Group Stages if they want to make it to a final again. They are such a good team, though, that you can’t rule them out of anything. They are capable of beating every team in the world, and being number one again. The only question is, will IEM5 World Championship be the tournament for mTw?

I won’t be surprised if they manage to come 2nd again.

Frag eXecutors - Predicted 2nd

Everyone has heard of ‘NEO’ for a good reason. Even when fX lose a match 16-6, in 85% of cases NEO will have the highest Rating (performance) on his team and is usually the second or third highest in the overall match.

He is probably the world’s best player because of this. In Counter-Strike, it is not hard to shine in a team of ‘average’ players because you will eventually be forced to eco and the game relies on complementary teamwork so much that you can only go so far. But NEO is someone who breaks that rule. Frag eXecutors always manage to break into a semi-final and then lose closely to the overall winner of the tournament. They have the talent in the team but for some reason, always miss out by an inch. I don’t think this is the tournament for fX, but they will definitely progress Group B.

Bracket Predictions

At this IEM World Championship, the bracket matches will be too close to call. Everyone will be relying on how the group matches fair out. I’m actually expecting most of my predictions to be a major fail, because of how many ‘upsets’ are able to happen at any given time.

As stated previously, Na`Vi won IEM4 World Championship in 2010 and this set off their streak for a lot more wins and the domination that followed for them. Will it be the case, this year? Probably not. There are more professional organisations coming to light and I think 2011 will be a year of many winners, not one.

For the finals, I expect Na`Vi to be the top 4 but I am secretly hoping for an SK-Gaming grand final appearance. At this level of Counter-Strike, topping your groups doesn’t ensure victory of the tournament or even a guarantee into the grand final. Will f0rest and GeT_RighT be able to pull huge numbers to take their team to the next level? It’s a big gamble.

It will be a fairy tale event if fnatic are able to win IEM5. So my money is going to be on their in-game leader, carn, delivering the goods necessary to take them all the way.

My predicted winner: fnatic