Quake.cz Quake Live TDM Nations Cup 2009: Group 3 Overview (HUN, SWE, BEL & POL B)
This is a review of the third group in the 2009 Quake Live TDM Nation Cup.
Today’s teams up for review are Sweden, Belgium, Hungary and Poland B.
Earlier I already did a review of both group 1 with the Netherlands, Italy, Poland A and the Czech Republic and group 2 with Portugal, Spain, Lithuania and France.
Group 3 Teams:
- [sweden] Sweden: azmo, doj, Spart1e, PURRI, proZaC, pow3rdani
- [belgium] Belgium: impulse, VeRTeX, KingpiN, shot
- [hungary] Hungary: Smoggii, dark, SectoR, Gandhi
- [poland] Poland B: Mad, Mav, 1o1, Blanka, eryk, liha
Team Sweden
Sweden is definitely the team to beat in this Nations cup. If it weren’t for the fact Sweden won many Quake 3 Nation cups in the past, then it’s definitely because they got some kick-ass players in their line up.
Spart1e is currently one of the top Quake 3 duellers in the world, having recently placed second in the ESWC Athens event. proZaC, from the many achievements over the past decade, won Eurocup 5 with the Swedish team the p1mps in 2002 when quake 3 was still very popular. Then there is PURRI [interview] who is probably one of the best, if not the best Quake 2 player of all time, in 2005 winning the Quakecon Quake 2 retro tournament.
The other players representing team Sweden, such as pow3rdani, azmo, hazter and doj, bare the burden of playing in the shadow of these giants. Yet they are nothing short of talent as well.
Even though the Swedish team doesn’t seem to find time to practice, the odds are great for them to reach first place in this group.
[sweden] Azmo: As a team we haven’t really played together, and I doubt we will play any practice games in the near future, it’s just too much of a hassle to get the team ready and find a server with 2 benevolent spectators and so on. Still, the biggest problem is probably time, people are busy, personally I’m pretty preoccupied with the upcoming birth of my first child, so now you know why if I were to leave midgame ;).
So far Sweden has played only one match against [hungary] Hungary, which they won in two maps:
[sweden] Sweden (W) vs [hungary] Hungary:
- Map 1 (dm6): 160:100 (Sweden wins)
- Map 2 (dm7): 168:122 (Sweden wins)
Team Belgium
It seems Belgium has managed to get quite a nice line up together for this Quake Live Nations cup. While at first it seemed there wasn’t going to be any Belgian team at all, [belgium] Impulse decided to take the initiative and contact some old school talent.
Both Impulse and VeRTeX are dinosaurs in the Belgian Quake 3 scene, having represented this tiny country on numerous occasions and still playing the game on a regular basis.
On the other side of the Belgian team, however, we find two players, KingpiN and Shot, who are what I very nicely refer to as “a bit less active“. An anecdote that illustrates their recent interest in Quake Live quite nicely was KingpiN asking during the warm up period of the Pol B vs BE match, how to open the Quake Live console. “GG!”, I tought.
[belgium] Impulse: KingpiN and shot haven’t played Quake Live yet so it will be fun to see how they will adapt.
But do not underestimate this team. Even though half of them are not playing Quake at all, these players know each others game very well and have plenty previous TDM experience, playing and winning against some of the best teams in the world.
[belgium] Impulse: We’ve played a lot before in Quake3/4 so yeah the team play should be good. If we get our aim going I can see ourselves reaching the semi finals at least.
Belgium has only played one match so far against Poland B. Fragster.de users had predicted a 97% chance of [poland] Poland B winning vs [belgium] Belgium. Obviously they were misinformed since the final score ended up being:
- Map 1 (dm7): 124:106 (Belgium wins)
- Map 2 (dm14): 98:54 (Belgium wins)
Clearly, even though very inactive, you cannot underestimate this team.
Holysh1t.net: What are your thoughts about the other teams in your group?
[belgium] Impulse: I think we can beat everyone including Sweden if we get our aim going.Holysh1t.net: Are there any countries you consider as a serious threat?
[belgium] Impulse: Not really no.Holysh1t.net: Any final thoughts about the Nations cup?
[belgium] Impulse: It’s great to be able to play with our team again. We will probably be very rusty but once we oil our engine we should be a force to be reckoned with.
Team Hungary
Hungary is known for its strong Quake 3 TDM squad with players such as dash and mdn leading the team to victory more often than not.
Yet it seems that the Hungarian superstars have sit out this Quake Live Nations cup and left other players the opportunity to represent their country, such as Smoggii, dark, SectoR and Gandhi.
Regardless of the lack of interest in Quake Live from the general Hungarian quake community, they still have a more than decent line up, capable of giving every team in group 3 a decent sweat.
My attention in the group mainly goes out to the [belgium] Belgium vs [hungary] Hungary match because both teams seem to perform very equally and because I think this match will be very decisive for the overal outcome in the group. It’s my prediction these two teams will be fighting over the second place.
Yet I wouldn’t really want to bet any money on it either. Poland B is practicing very often and they have a strong team as well. Even though Poland has lost their first match against Belgium, many things are still possible.
Team Poland B
This is the second Polish team that’s participating in the Nations cup. Because there were 17 teams and only 16 spots available, [poland] Poland B had to play a match against [uk] UK B to qualify. Boy oh boy how exciting was this confrontation!
Not only was the first map decided by a sudden death overtime, also the last map ended up being a sudden death overtime where a team kill in the [uk] UK B team resulted in a victory and qualification for [poland] Poland B.
Poland B seems to have found a lot of time to practice together. However, considering how tough their group is and the fact they already lost a game against Belgium, I would see them having a very hard time making the playoffs.
[poland] Mad: We feel very confident we have beaten UK B! Hehe ;). To be honest, we aint confident at all because of the rotation in our line up, ping and the overall whine in the team :). If we would be lucky just like in game vs UK B we could maybe even get out from the group stage. I’m pretty sure that Sweden is going to beat us and I hope we gonna have tough games vs other opponents :).
Again, thanks to the captain(s) who send me their interview answers! For an overview of the last remaining group, check back here at holysh1t.net in the next few days. You can subscribe by mail or RSS to receive the news delivered by Google in your mailbox as soon as there’s an update. All the info and links about the event can be found on our Quake Live Nations Cup page.
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go Belgium 🙂