by ESB’s free Counter-Strike: Global Offensive betting predictions for Thursday, January 19, focus on the first round of BLAST Premier Spring Groups 2023. Here are our selections for Heroic vs Evil Geniuses and Team Vitality vs Astralis, with esports betting odds courtesy of BetOnline.
HEROIC vs EVIL GENIUSES CS:GO BETTING & MATCH DETAILS |
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|---|---|
| Best Odds: | Heroic -1000 at BetOnline | EG +600 at BetOnline |
| When: | January 19, 2023 | 15:00 CET |
| Watch Live: | Twitch (https://www.twitch.tv/BLASTPremier) |
Heroic ended the 2022 season on a high note. First, they claimed silver from Intel Extreme Masters Rio Major and then added the team’s first Big Event title, winning BLAST Premier Fall Finals 2022 in front of their home crowd.
The Danes concluded the year with a seventh-eighth finish at BLAST Premier World Final 2022 in December, but that didn’t take away from the improvement Casper “cadiaN” Møller and co. showed in the final months of 2022. In contrast, Evil Geniuses have yet to find their footing in the upper level of competitive CS:GO.
Evil Geniuses won their last event in August 2020 and have been since struggling to achieve anything noteworthy – even in domestic competitions. Earlier this week, EG promoted Jerric “wiz” Jiang as a replacement for Tsvetelin “CeRq” Dimitrov, but it’s highly unlikely that the roster swap will result in any noticeable improvement in EG’s game.
Evil Geniuses used are only a shadow of their former selves, and even that’s an understatement. This is a second-tier team at best, going against the current no.1 squad in the world. We don’t expect any surprises on Thursday.
Heroic -11.5 rounds
TEAM VITALITY vs ASTRALIS CS:GO BETTING & MATCH DETAILS |
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|---|---|
| Best Odds: | Vitality -175.44 at BetOnline | Astralis +125 at BetOnline |
| When: | January 19, 2023 | 18:30 CET |
| Watch Live: | Twitch (https://www.twitch.tv/BLASTPremier) |
Team Vitality and Astralis are two Counter-Strike teams you would expect to do well with the rosters they field, yet they’ve not achieved much in the latter stages of 2022. Vitality still struggle to find a way to fully utilise Lotan “Spinx” Giladi, while Astralis are stumbling around trying to relive their glory days from 2018-2019.
On a more positive note, these are two very stacked teams, so it’s only a matter of time before they bounce back. The problem is that there is no clear indication that it will happen anytime soon.
Priced at -175.44 with esports betting sites, the French squad enter this match as heavy favourites due to Astralis’ shaky showing at CCT Central Europe Series #4. But that sounds like a lousy excuse to favour Team Vitality as much.
This is a winnable match for Astralis, and even though the Danes might need a bit more time to re-learn how to play with Nicolai “dev1ce” Reedtz, this roster has enough talent to re-emerge as one of the top-three in the world. Expect a close match and a three-map series.
