Darkdwarf — I originally wrote this list down only so I could have something interesting to think about while wasting time in my history class, but  ShoX made me complete it with some actual text and stuff. Could be bad PR for Vanilla, had the methods come out… But I’m a nice guy, and I’ll do as ShoX commands. Enjoy (or don’t, if you’re the bitter kind of guy)!

 

Epsilon eSports - 28/30
 KnOxXx – 4/5
 numlocked – 5/5
 Mike – 5/5
 GeaR – 4/5
 schocky – 5/5
 wltrs – 5/5

Topping the list with an almost perfect score in my entirely subjective, and probably totally incorrect, judgement; is Epsilon eSports. They’ve reformed their roster after their devastating third place at i46, with  F2,  Extremer and  Shintaz leaving the team.  KnOxXx has moved from pocket soldier to his main class medic, leaving the place open for MGE hero (saving the grace of Europe in MGE, beating TLR at i46)  Mike. If Mike was looking to get some revenge on his former mates in Infused, he’s going to have to pull off some friendly fire, as the demoman and teamleader from  Team Infused is now on his own team.  Numlocked is going to be rocking some huge damage outputs now that he’s surrounded with a team void of finn troublemakers. I couldn’t bear to put a perfect score on Europe’s new superteam, so KnOxXx gets a minus for maybe being a bit rusty on medic, and  GeaR gets a minus for almost quitting TF2 after i46.

Player who needs to step up:  wltrs needs to man up and go to some LAN events!

Player who will carry: numlocked.

BFF - 25/30
 Mirelin – 4/5
 kaidus – 5/5
 Darn! – 2/5
 Zebbosai – 5/5
 cookye – 5/5
 bybben – 4/5

Darn!‘s new lineup features his old partner in crime from the days of  Dignitas dominance – scout extraordinaire  bybben. Partnering bybben on the flank will be  cookye, whom he scouted with on i46, and  Zebbosai, last season’s top soldier and a hotly sought after pick in the latest off-season. Big question here is: who is going to roam on the team? Zebbosai proved last season that he’s the best roamer in Premiership, and Darn! has proved earlier that he’s the kind of pocket no medic wants. Is  Mirelin perhaps going to glue his medic beam onto kaidus, and let him carry the team? Or maybe Darn!’s had a revelation after his loss-induced rage at i46, and has trained himself to become a better pocket, who knows? Certainly not I, so I will continue to believe Darn! to be one of the worst pockets in Premiership right now.

Player who needs to step up: Darn!

Player who will carry: cookye.

Crack Clan – 20/30
 Admirable – 3/5
 Retsh0ck – 4/5
Minimoose – 2/5
 ipz – 3/5
 TviQ – 4/5
 smzi – 4/5

Right now, team leader  Admirable‘s probably pretty upset about losing his pocket soldier MatnuN to a ban. MatnuN has continually been one of the best pockets in Europe for the last 4 or so seasons, and also has played all this time alongside  Retsh0ck, with a good chemistry going. It is a big hole in the team coordination that quickly recruited  Minimoose has to fill, but I think he will do so, after a few weeks/months of practise with the team. Germans smzi and ipz are both looking for a real breakthrough in the Premiership division this season, and they are both trying real hard lately, with smzi bringing out a 3.5 KA:D ratio in the Process cup final against Nitrose.

Player who needs to step up: Minimoose needs to become the next MatnuN.

Player who will carry:  TviQ.

PunchLine – 22/30
 k3 – 3/5
 Flinn – 3/5
 CaptainHax – 4/5
 Tek – 4/5
 Flippy – 5/5
 Plapla – 3/5

PunchLine‘s back for another go at Premiership victory. They made it to the playoffs last season as the first team I’ve seen to come out of division 1 and progress to a top4 placement. PunchLine gained a lot of respect last season as they dealt blows to all the top teams, and question is: was that because of underestimation, in which case the increased respect will only hurt the french team, or was it a case of coordination and tactics, in which case PunchLine will continue to profit from established teamwork and strategies. All teams should watch out for the extremely deadly sniper rifle Flippy carries with him, and the well-coordinated soldier pair of  CaptainHax and  Tek.

Player who needs to step up:  Flinn is the weakest link in the team, on the strongest class.

Player who will carry: CaptainHax.

Quarantine – 18/30
 Kritzonite – 3/5
 fuo – 4/5
 Baribur – 2/5
 Kalhó – 2/5
 zappis – 5/5
 erectus – 2/5

Quarantine suffered the loss of  Tarkus just before the start of the season, as he was banned for cheating (thanks to Anakin‘s plug-in). Replacing him in the lineup is probably going to be  Baribur or  Knutsson, two soldiers from their previous lineups. If Knutsson still has the same work times as before, I’d think he’s out of the picture. This team is looking rather ramshackle from the outside, with demoman-turned-scout  erectus partnering up with old  CKRAS-scout  zappis on the flank. That is a very unpredictable scout duo – neither zappis nor erectus have consitently played for a Premiership team for a long time, so who knows how they’ll do against pairs like TviQ/smzi or cookye/bybben.  Fuo has been looking strong on demo lately and is the star on the team in my opinion. It’ll be interesting to see Quarantine play against the other teams of lower Premiership.

Player who needs to step up: Hard to say, but I’ll go with fuo.

Player who will carry: zappis.

EDIT: I’ve given up to Tarkus’s irc-rage and rated zappis to a 5/5. Cheers!

Chinese Mafia - 20/30
 Pootash Pierre – 3/5
 ups – 3/5
 Raliator – 3/5
 evokje – 2/5
 quad – 5/5
 Gubbins – 4/5

This newly formed team got into the Premiership through the tough qualifiers introduced this season. On their way they beat Naughty Badmen and  uV-gaming in two very close games. They performed above expectations, with  quad bringing out his famous pistol, as well as some clutch spy plays from  Gubbins. His spy’ing was so good it brought out  Byte‘s appreciative comments many times on the cast. My keen eye observes some similaritites between this team and old Premiership teams  Exotic Island and  2stroNg, which promises some surprise results from the team. Hopefully this team won’t follow  Taimou‘s teams’ into the dropped abyss, though.

Player who needs to step up: Certainly not quad.

Player who will carry: quad.

Team Decerto – 17/30
 ilike2spin – 2/5
 Spary – 3/5
 Daleth – 3/5
 snyyppis – 2/5
 Stark – 4/5
 Tack – 2/5

This team advanced from division 1 last name under the name of Avenue eSports. Now they’ve picked up the torch ( Daleth) from the team that advanced to Premiership last season and call themselves  Team Decerto. Daleth and  Spary are the only players on the team with experience playing in Premiership, but they’re not the only ones with experience at the top.  Stark was surprisingly picked to partner  Greg in the Nations’ Cup (be sure to tune in to the final tomorrow evening!), and he has produced some good plays for his country. Question is: will he be able to produce the same results now that he swaps Greg for  Tack? Team Decerto most certainly will be one of the teams fighting to avoid relegation at the end of the season.

Player who needs to step up: Snyyppis.

Player who will carry: Stark.

Nitrose – 17/30
Evilmoon – 3/5
hys – 3/5
Cyber – 3/5
Traxantic – 2/5
Droso – 3/5
d0nut – 3/5

 Nitrose proved that they’re capable of competing with the big guys at i46, giving, amongst others,  TCM-gaming a run for their money in a three-map, dramatic game.  Droso has experience from playing at this level, but he is the only one on his team. Premiership really is a different deal compared to division 1, and I have a feeling Nitrose will suffer from the things PunchLine didn’t suffer from last season. Other than that  Cyber has proved to be surprisingly good at pocket, and  hys and  Evilmoon complements him well in the combo. One of few teams in Premiership to actually have a stronger combo than flank. Will this play into their hands or not? I have no idea!

Player who needs to step up:  Traxantic.

Player who will carry: Cyber.

 

 

The first games of the season will decide if I’m a rambling idiot or actually have some insight in this game. Below is the full list of week 1 games. I don’t know what games will be casted, but do watch those that are!

20/9: Quarantine vs Decerto
20/9: BFF vs Epsilon
20/9: Crack Clan vs PunchLine
16/9: Nitrose vs Chinese Mafia