Moscow Cybersport Series S3 betting tips – Wednesday 24/3/2021

ESB’s StarCraft II betting tips for Wednesday focus on three Moscow Cybersport Series Season 3 fixtures. Here are our best bets for Arctur vs Friend, MilkiCow vs GeNieS, and Nicoract vs DIMAGA.


Aleksey “Arctur” Rozhnov enters this match off a 0-3 loss against Aleksandr “Bly” Svysiuk in the upper bracket that marked his third consecutive defeat. Having dropped down to the lower bracket, Arctur’s chances to recreate his fifth-eighth finish from Moscow Cybersport Series Season 2 seem rather low, although he is heavily favoured to defeat Anton “Friend” Yashenko.

Friend is priced at long odds to win this match, and for good reason. The former Warcraft pro has yet to make a name for himself in the SCII esports scene and has not appeared in any tournament of note since his 57th-64th finish at the 2019 World Championship Series (WCS) Spring event.

Online bookmakers are paying +116 on Arctur to cover the 2.5-map handicap, which is significantly higher than what we expected to see. A fairer price would sit at around -125, so we don’t need to think twice before making our decision.


The moneyline odds offered on this match seem about right since it’s fair to expect Ilya “MilkiCow” Potapov to win with relative ease. He is a far more established player who did well during the second season of the competition, where his only loss came against the eventual finalist Vitaliy “Couguar” Roshchin.

Aleksey “GeNieS” Gasanov is a relatively unknown in the CIS SCII scene, seeing how he has not qualified for a single major tournament in his five-year career. One thing GeNieS has going for him is that he usually does well against Terran, but MilkiCow is an entirely different beast to opponents GeNieS usually faces.

We expect MilkiCow to win, but due to his shaky form of late, there is a world where he drops a map. A correct score bet on MilkiCow to win 3-1 might appeal to some, but for us, a bet on the favourite to win with at least two maps to spare will do.


Dmytro “DIMAGA” Filipchuk and Vitaliy “Nicoract” Mishin last met back in December 2020, when DIMAGA won 2-0 and improved his head-to-head record to 3-2. Although the 34-year-old Ukrainian has done relatively well in his meetings with Nicoract, he enters this match on a six-game losing streak.

Even though most of those losses came against stronger players, losing six straight games must take a toll on DIMAGA’s morale. Nicoract hasn’t done much better of late, seeing how he has won only one game in his last four, but that doesn’t justify the shorter odds.

DIMAGA should be slightly favoured for this match, but we don’t believe he should be priced as low as he is. This match can go either way, so we have to take the better odds on Nicoract.