TSM vs Team Liquid Prediction: Much will depend on the performance of one player

On Wednesday, July 20, the first game day of a charity Dota 2 tournament in the UAE will kick off with a hefty $4,000,000 prize pool. Team TSM and Team Liquid will play in the first match of the tournament.

The Riyadh Masters 2022 is a Dota 2 tournament that will take place July 20-24, 2022. The ten strongest teams from around the world will compete for $4,000,000. In addition to the cash prizes, the teams will have an international show of strength before the U.S. majors start in early August.

The main question to TSM before this tournament - did the guys come here with the desire to win, or we will see the same gutless and poorly motivated Americans? The main mistake of many people is to write off TSM and they do it since the Undying pack. The players in their turn showed themselves well on TI10, in the Majors in Sweden (2 place), and even were the first from North America who guaranteed their place on TI11.

TSM's regional league play this summer looked more like the team was just flubbing the summer DPC league neatly. Strangely, the American organization didn't make their squad work hard in the run-up to the home majors, but they know better, as the main tournament is only three months away from 2022.

For TSM this is their second tournament in the UAE and at the first (GAMERS GALAXY: Invitational Series Dubai 2022) in early March they finished 7-8th, which shows not much spirit to reveal their billets. It's worth realizing that this is already the richest organization, not the same Undying that asked fans for bootcamp money before the international. Nowadays even $4,000,000 can be ignored, the guys have a good salary, and the TI11 is coming up.

The TSM team is ex-Undying. To be honest, I really liked Undying for its identity. It's really a team that in a year not just got together and somehow played in their region, but guys were selected for TI10 and showed themselves quite well in some places. The main problem of the pack was the lack of organization, the money was a real problem, and I'm very glad that such a famous organization as TSM signed these guys. Usually when CIS talent "lands on the payroll", the game suddenly disappears somewhere, but the current TSM won their regional finals in February, which brought them even closer to participating in TI11.

If we go over the TSM team personalities, the Czech offlaner SabeRLight, who not so long ago played for the now disbanded Ninjas in Pyjamas, stands out in the team. He is no stranger to North America, having been on loan to the Quincy Crew in 2019, so he knows the region well.

The current TSM was assembled based on the Undying team, which, in turn, was formed mainly by representatives of the disbanded CR4ZY team: mid Bryle, MoonMeander, and DuBu, noting that the latter still has experience as a coach. The Korean played at The International 2015 as part of the MVP and finished 7th-8th in the tournament at the time.

The Peruvian Timado is an interesting carry for the TSM team, who shows a stable game. At TI10 we didn't really believe in these guys, but they managed to surprise us by taking points from any team. VP and T1 were able to beat the Americans, but OG and Invictus Gaming could not defeat the feisty "immortal" guys. "Immortal" even managed to beat their principled opponents from EG, but lost in the first round of the playoffs in the losers. After TI10, the team didn't change the roster, but only got organized and now they're TSM.

Team Liquid has been doing well throughout the 2021/22 DPC cycle in Europe. In the winter tourney, the team achieved a championship, while still finishing second in the regional winter finals, where extra DPC points were awarded instead of the first canceled major. In the spring, the Liquid team was third in the regional league and went to the majors, where they performed mediocrely, finishing 9-12th. Due to their failure in the Majors, the European team had to try to perform well in the Summer Tour of the Regional League and Team Liquid succeeded, the players became second, earning a ticket to the August Majors in the U.S.

At the Riyadh Masters 2022, the European team will play with a replacement. The great and mighty Ana will replace the Finnish "liquid" carry MATUMBAMAN. Why the Finn didn't go to the UAE with the team is unknown, but it's much more important for Team Liquid that their main player could get to the United States with the team, and on Arabian soil, you can roffle with Ana. No, I'm not a fan of the legendary player, but the Australian isn't the same player that was at TI8, TI9... In 2021 he tried to make a comeback in OG, but after playing for exactly two months he left. And now he's back again after one year. In modern Dota such coming back doesn't give results, that's why the performance of the Australian will be interesting for all, but it guarantees the success of Team Liquid, because the game of MATUMBAMAN differs from the performance of Ana and whether the new teammates of Dota legend will be able to adapt to him very quickly, is a difficult question.

I don't expect great results for Team Liquid at the Riyadh Masters 2022, but in the game against TSM, the team has a good chance to succeed, even if Ana hasn't played Dota for a year.

At the Swedish Majors in May 2022 these teams have already played each other and twice TSM defeated their current opponent, and without much trouble. 

I think that the teams will play in a draw and we will have a banal map exchange. So I suggest we take the risk and bet on X for 2.05.

On the first map, the opponents will please us with a lot of frags, so it makes sense to bet on Total Over 48.5 frags for 1.85.

The second map will go longer than 38 minutes; the odds are 2.33.