Playoff stage - Round 1 - Poland vs Italy
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Date/Time: 20/03 at 21:30 CET (time changed)
Maps: Poland choose Algiers (CTF) - Italy forced Casa (TS)
Coverage: details will be posted later
Match link Don't forget to place your bets
Poland made it to the playoffs after a fairily easy group stage. They were in Group B and faced Yugoslavia, Slovakia, Chile and Australia. Splatt's crew outplayed SVK, YUG and CHL. The decider match of the group was against Australia. Both teams won their home map, Poland by far on Tohunga CTF and Australia only just on Austria TS. Therefore it needed a bomb mode decider map to bring us the winner of Group B: Australia.
Italy started very well in a fairly tough group where 5 teams fought for the first 3 spots: Turkey, Nordic, USA, Belgium and Italy itself. India seemed the weakest team in the group since the very start and it ended to be true. Italy won against Turkey (disqualified for knowingly playing with a cheater), India and USA (only just) in the first 3 matches. After that winning streak, Brizz' team was maybe too confident about the match against Nordic team and Zizou's squad served them a not so nice surprise by winning two maps and grabbing the 1st place. The decider match vs Belgium was tense. A draw would have been enough to make it to the next stage but Italy wanted to avoid the 3rd spot and a win was needed to reach the goal. Unfortunately for Pizzas, Belgium showed their best gameplay so far in the competition. Italy managed to win Casa by one only round in the last seconds before being smashed on a one way (Belgium) Kindom_rc6, both TS.
This match will be particularly interesting since it promises to be very even. Poland can field a very good team for both CTF and TS. Italy, on the other hand, has got a very strong TS lineup but a relatively weak CTF one. Everything makes us thing there will be a third decider map. The winner of this match will face Team France, the defending champion and the biggest favourite to win this year's NC as well.
For stats click read more
Written by AlexDenton
Odd's
Winner
Poland: 60%
Italy: 40%
Winner in straight maps
Poland: 30%
Italy: 20%
Decider map: 50%
Winner after the decider
Poland: 60%
Italy: 40%