ESL Impact Valencia Begins Today

Republished By Plato

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ESL Impact Valencia kicks off today, with eight teams competing across three days of LAN play for the lion’s share of a $100,000 prize pool.

The tournament begins with a GSL group stage, where the opening and winners’ matches are best-of-one and the elimination and decider matches are best-of-three. Four teams will then qualify for a single elimination best-of-three bracket, with the grand final taking place on Sunday 3 July at 18:00 .

Nigma Galaxy arrive in Valencia as favourites

This is the second big ESL Impact event, the first taking place at IEM Dallas which saw Nigma Galaxy take first place, FURIA fe come in second with BIG EQUIPA and CLG Red rounding out the top four. Joining those four favourites are Mindfreak who also competed in Dallas, as well as three new teams in the form of NAVI Javelins, MIBR fe and GODSENT fe.

The players to watch for Impact Valencia will be Ana “⁠ANa⁠” Dumbravă and Ksenia “⁠vilga⁠” Kluenkova from Nigma Galaxy, who posted 1.36 and 1.24 ratings over 8 maps in Dallas, and Olga “⁠Olga⁠” Rodrigues of FURIA fe, who racked up a 1.29 rating over 10 maps.

ESL Challenger and Impact Valencia Fantasy games now live

It is hard to see past Nigma Galaxy when it comes to predicting a winner in Valencia, with the team’s only close call in Dallas coming against FURIA fe in a tight 19-17 win in the group stage. They later comfortably defeated FURIA fe in the final however, narrowly losing Mirage 14-16 only to run over their Brazilian counterparts on Vertigo and Overpass, 16-5 and 16-7.

The talent for the event is as follows:

Sam “⁠Tech Girl⁠” Wright – Host

Hege “⁠Hedje⁠” Botnen – Analyst
Stephanie “⁠missharvey⁠” Harvey – Analyst

Anders “⁠Anders⁠” Blume – Commentator
Sudhen “⁠Bleh⁠” Wahengbam – Commentator
Lucy “LucyLuce” Eastwood – Commentator
Veronique “Vearless” Zonneveld – Commentator