Royal Never Give Up vs Entity Prediction: A highly embarrassing relegation of a Chinese team?

The highly anticipated DotA II playoffs of The International 11 tournament begin on October 20. After the group stage and replay, four teams left the tournament. Some of the results were quite unexpected, while others were fully deserved. The total prize pool of the tournament is much smaller than last year but still more than $16 million at the moment.

In the first round of the lower bracket, Royal Never Give Up, and Entity will play each other.

The saddest story so far at the current The International. After the first two days of play, Royal Never Give Up had the best record among all the other teams. The Chinese team had four wins and one draw. It was almost certain that if the team would not take first place in the group, they would qualify for the upper bracket.

On the 17th, it turns out that virtually the entire Royal Never Give Up squad has fallen ill with covid. And that's truly terrible news. The team did not withdraw from the tournament and played their matches on painkillers, but lost all their next four meetings 0-2 and made it to the lower bracket. To go from 9-1 to 9-9 is a terrible blow to team morale.

It may not be just that, though. After all, Royal Never Give Up played against the weakest opponents in their group on the first two days and then just against the strongest. Maybe it all adds up? Maybe this team wasn't that strong, and the illness worsened their already less-than-ideal condition? After all, it is hard to predict how successful Royal Never Give Up could be against top opponents in a healthy state. But we have now that the players are neither mentally nor physically ready.

There are quite a few questions about Entity. They were initially rated as favorites, but the group stage results do not do justice to that title at all. ,Entity has won just one win in nine games, drawn four times, and lost just as many.

On the final day, the team had to play a re-match against Talon, and this time they decided to play with dignity. And that's very strange. What is strange is that Entity crushed everyone in European qualification, twice trivially destroying Team Secret. But now the Puppey team is doing much better than Entity.

There may have been an underestimation of what was going on from Fishman and his teammates. But after the group stage, there was a time not to rethink everything that happened. Individually the Entity players are very strong, and as a team, they know how to prove themselves. Surely already in the first match of the lower bracket, everything will change. In addition, we were very lucky with the opponent.

Whatever was in the group stage will remain in the group stage. Entity will still have a chance to prove themselves. The weakened Chinese are unlikely to hinder them so you can opt for an Entity win for 2.26.

The match is unlikely to be a tight one. There will be a few fights, as well as Total frags. It is worth taking Total Under 45.5 frags for 1.83.