ESL Pro League S22 Playoff Predictions: Victory Chances and Current Team Form
The ESL Pro League S22 group stage took place from September 28 to October 8, divided into two phases. Over these 10 days, many surprises occurred, from the failures of main favorites to a potential team disqualification and the tournament losing its Ranked status. However, heading into the playoffs, everything fell into place and we’ll truly see the eight best teams competing. Who among them will lift the trophy? Let’s figure it out together!
What Does the Playoff Bracket Look Like?
The playoffs will traditionally follow a single-elimination format – meaning teams won’t have a second chance, but this time the organizers decided to add a third-place match. While the reason for this decision is quite clear – teams want to fight for every point in the VALVE ranking system – for viewers, this is an absolutely uninteresting and meaningless match.
It’s also worth noting that the playoffs will be held without a studio audience at ESL’s facility in Sweden, and this is the last ESL Pro League tournament in this format. It’s hard to say whether this fact will give anyone an advantage, as only experienced teams made it to the final stage (with the exception of 3DMAX perhaps). Certainly it looks less spectacular, but we hope this won’t affect the events on the server.
Team Spirit vs FaZe
Both teams have quite an interesting story at this event – the Dragons debuted with a new roster featuring tN1R, while FaZe, besides the returned Twistzz, were forced to call rain and ask him to come to Stockholm. It’s unclear how such a mishap could occur at tier-1 level, but a few hours before FaZe’s first match, they weren’t allowed to participate. The issue was that when invites were issued, their roster included s1mple, ELiGE, and rain, and the team had to bring back one of them so the tournament wouldn’t lose its Ranked status. While calling rain back was fairly obvious, why he replaced jcobbb instead of Twistzz is a big question. Let’s assume karrigan once again decided to “boost morale” and play with the “golden” lineup that once dominated everyone.
Considering they started the group 0:2 – the first loss was technical, and rain arrived for the second game without any warmup – making the playoffs is a very good result. But will they be able to handle Spirit?
The Dragons only lost one map on this event to Inner Circle, and otherwise dealt with their opponents almost without problems. The team’s newcomer slightly changed their style, and now Spirit has its own star player like ropz, who plays the role of a thorn in opponents’ backlines. Risky pushes, playing behind the attack – none of this existed during zontix’s time, and we can confidently say that the Dragons’ playstyle has significantly changed. Andrey clearly brought more emotion, which could be useful for Spirit in difficult matches. The other players continue to perform their functions brilliantly and are ready to replace each other if someone’s game isn’t going well.
Moving to the matchup itself, it’s not entirely clear how FaZe can emerge victorious. The only way to beat the Dragons is to simply get up on the right side of the bed, provided Spirit suffers from insomnia all night before the quarterfinal. Of course, players of this caliber will put up a fight, but in terms of firepower they’re not stronger than the youth of Spirit, and from a team coordination perspective, hally will clearly be able to outplay NEO.
Spirit victory with 80% probability.
FURIA vs Vitality
Probably the most competitive match of all quarterfinals, not only in strengths but also weaknesses. Both teams heavily depend on their sniper’s performance – when molodoy is shooting, FURIA is unstoppable, and the same applies to ZywOo and Vitality. Following this logic, no matter what form the young Kazakhstani sniper is in, the experienced Frenchman is of course stronger in any scenario.
Of course, we don’t want to rely solely on this theory, so let’s dig a bit deeper. FURIA has been in Sweden for almost two weeks and played 9 out of 10 game days, which on one hand can be seen as game rhythm, and on the other – accumulated fatigue. Judging by the results, it looks more like a positive trend, but two days of rest could reset this factor.
Neither FURIA nor Vitality play Ancient, and their map pools are quite similar, so predicting which maps the teams will choose is very difficult. Most likely it won’t be decided without a decider, which could be Inferno, Train, or Overpass. Despite everything, picking a favorite here is very difficult – FURIA is showing truly quality and interesting CS, while Vitality still maintains their reputation as a hegemon.
We’ll leave this match as 50-50.
MOUZ vs NAVI
Moving to the lower part of the playoff bracket, where teams with 3:1 and 3:2 records met, the most notable thing is that both teams lost their matches against Falcons. Both also played against 3DMAX, but the Mice won their match while NAVI lost, finding themselves one step away from elimination. Moreover, MOUZ won absolutely easily and didn’t even notice the French presence on the server.
MOUZ looks much more prepared, with no obvious weak spots or any problems with morale or team coordination. NAVI, as always, has a good game plan, but execution can sometimes let them down. Every NAVI victory is tied to an individual over-performance by one of the players – either iM delivers a life game, in another b1t finishes the series with a 1.94 rating, or w0nderful decides not to miss with the AWP. In our view, this is quite a “shaky” condition for victory, considering that equally skilled guys who can aim just as well will be sitting on the other side.
Each team has a 100% win rate on Train, and in one interview, B1ad3 said they put huge emphasis on this map during preparation and have already picked it twice at EPL S22. But an 11:13 against 3DMAX and a nearly surrendered comeback from 1:11 against HOTU makes this 100% win rate not so confident. It turns out NAVI not only loses their pick but potentially leaves an extremely comfortable decider for MOUZ. Of course, the Born to Win coach will find opponents’ weak points and be able to choose comfortable maps, but will they be able to execute all the ideas that emerge?
MOUZ is the favorite for us in this matchup, and we put their advancement at 60 percent probability.
Falcons vs 3DMAX
At first glance, this quarterfinal seems most straightforward and obvious. The French with their reckless style of endless aggression should become a very comfortable opponent for Falcons, who also play off skill and shooting. If you compare each player head to head, hardly anyone would doubt that Falcons are unconditionally stronger here.
Does this mean everything is too obvious? We don’t think so. Falcons still have a huge hole in the form of a weak Inferno, while the French feel like fish in water on this map. Therefore, for us, this match automatically starts at 0:1, and with such a scenario, Falcons’ chances of victory significantly decrease. The decider should be Nuke, and here the knife round will decide a lot, as on this map the defensive side has been dominating the attacking side too much lately.
Of course, looking at the nicknames and Falcons’ 3:0 from the group stage, they should advance further in any case. Ilya Osipov seems to have regained his form, NiKo and kyousuke are showing high numbers, TeSeS can always turn it on at the right moment and win a game-deciding clutch. The only problems are with tactics, where zonic and kyxsan have absolutely nothing to boast about. Considering that 3DMAX also can’t adequately respond in this component of the game, we still believe in Falcons’ strength.
65% for a positive outcome of the meeting for NiKo and company.
Victory Chances
This is one of the few tournaments in recent times where there truly isn’t a clearly defined leader. The second half of 2025 has been pleasing with a variety of champions, and it’s not unlikely we’ll see new faces who haven’t yet lifted trophies in the current season. However, considering the teams’ bracket placement and the form we saw in the group stage, the victory chances should look approximately like this:
- Team Spirit — 24%
- MOUZ — 22%
- Vitality — 19%
- Falcons — 16%
- FURIA — 8%
- NAVI — 5%
- FaZe — 4%
- 3DMAX — 2%
Author: Alex
Alex is an author and esports observer with more than seven years of experience. He specializes in analyzing new releases in the world of computer games, gaming services, and in-game economies. Alex shares practical experience and an expert perspective on the development of gaming, helping readers understand complex mechanics and stay up to date with the latest news.
