This Week In eSports Betting We Focus On LoL KeSPA Cup Finale And More
Published: Nov 11, 2015 - Last Updated: Jul 21, 2024
In the wake of their success at the League of Legends World Championships 2015, team SK Telecom T1 are on the brink of further success in another huge tournament, the 2015 League of 
Legends KeSPA Cup.
This Korean-based offline tournament kicked off on the 6th November with 14 teams participating but two of those teams, SK Telecom T1 and KT Rolster were seeded through to the quarter final stages.
The remaining 12 teams all faced off in a knockout round with six teams progressing into the quarter final stages.
In the quarter finals, KT Rolster defeated CTU Pathos 2-1 and CJ Entus defeated Jin Air 2-0 to qualify for the first semi final, while team Ever qualified for the second semi final where they will face the all-conquering SK Telecom T1, who defeated SBENU in a tight match up 2-1.
The two semi finals and the final will be played over the next couple of days to decide who will emerge victorious as winners, though the smart money is on SK Telecom T1 emerging with another big win in what is proving to be a hotly contested tournament between the cream of the crop of Korean League of Legends teams.
The Semi Finals will be played over a best of three basis, however the final will be a best of five contest, which does seem to give the stronger teams an advantage.
The winner of the 100,000,000 South Korean Won top prize (approximately £57,000) will also guarantee themselves a spot in the IEM Season X event taking place in Cologne just before Christmas, where the winners of the KeSPA Cup will take on two teams from Europe, two from North America and a Chinese team for the title.
CS:GO iBUYPOWER Cup takes centre stage in Santa Ana, California this weekend
The $100,000 prize pool iBUYERPOWER Cup is a two-day event that kicks off on Saturday 14th November, culminating a day later with the award of a $65,000 first prize to the team that can prove themselves the best Counter Strike: Global Offensive team of the weekend.
Eight teams will travel to California with the hope of claiming the top prize and they have been drawn into two groups for the initial group stage of the competition.
- Group A: Luminosity Gaming, Winterfox, Counter Logic Gaming and Renegades
- Group B: Cloud9, Conquest, Team Liquid, compLexity Gaming
The top two teams in each group will qualify for the semi finals taking on opponents from the other group, with the two winners of each semi final progressive to Sunday’s showpiece final.
At the moment, the eSports betting sites have this as a relatively tight race between three teams for the title with Luminosity the 11/5 favourites ahead of joint second favourites Team Liquid and Cloud 9, CLG are 7/1 shots, Conquest 8/1 shots and Renegades are available to back in the outright market at 10/1. The Outsiders are compLexity at 14/1 and Winterfox are the 18/1 rank outside bet.
Bookmakers will be offering betting not just on the outright market, but also on individual match ups in the competition both in the group stages and the knockout phase, meaning that if you want some excellent esports betting on CS:GO this weekend, then the iBUYPOWER Cup is a great choice.
Valve’s Frankfurt Major Kicks off the Dota Major Championships Series this weekend
Ever since Valve, the company behind the hugely popular Dota 2 game, announced that they would be setting up three Major events in the calendar year to sit 
alongside The International event, there has been fevered anticipation ahead of the first of these.
Well on Friday 13th November, the first Major Event for Valve’s new championship gets under way at the Festhalle Messe in Frankfurt as the eight invited teams and the eight qualifiers will finally lock horns in the Frankfurt Major 2015.
The event has a staggering prize pool of $3,000,000, with the winning team taking home an astonishing $1,100,000, making it one of the richest events in the eSports calendar.
The 16 teams participating have been drawn into four Groups, labelled A-D as such:
- Group A – Evil Geniuses, Fnatic, Virtus.pro, Newbee
- Group B – Vici Gaming, Team Unknown, Vega Squadron, OG
- Group C – Team Secret, Newbee Young, LGD Gaming, Cloud9
- Group D – EHOME.cn, Alliance, CDEC Gaming, Mineski
The competition begins with a league phase where the top two teams in each group will qualify for the winners bracket. The bottom two teams in each group get a second chance in the losers bracket.
In the Winners bracket, teams will play through until one team remains to progress to the Grand Final.
In the Winners bracket, any team losing a match will drop down into the losers bracket for a second chance to reach the final. If any team loses in the losers bracket, then they are eliminated from the competition.
The bookies have Team Secret as the 5/2 favourites, though Vici Gaming are 10/3 shots and Evil Geniuses are 5/1 shots. The rank outsiders according to the bookmakers are Cloud 9 at 50/1, Mineski at 66/1 and Team Unknown who are the 100/1 shots.
This is the second big eSports event in Germany in the space of a few weeks coming on the back of the League of Legends World Finals, which took place in Berlin just 14 days ago and with further events planned for Cologne as well as other German cities, the country is fast becoming a hotbed of International eSports action.
Starcraft 2 GPL International Challenge kicks off in Shanghai on Sunday
Eight of the best international players of Starcraft 2 will convene in Shanghai, China to contest the 2015 GPL International Challenge, with a top prize of $15,000 out of a total purse of $42,800 up for grabs for the winner.
The event is scheduled to run throughout next week, meaning that eSports betting fans will get plenty of opportunity to enjoy betting on the tournament over the next seven days or so.
This is an unusual event in that the tournament will be played on an individual basis (with the top prize of $15,000 available for that) and also a doubles event known as Archon Mode, which will see the top pair of players walking away with a $4,000 first prize.
As such, there are effectively two competitions in progress in this event. In the 1v1 event, each of the four Chinese players has been drawn against one of the four international players (one from France, one from Norway plus two from South Korea). The winners progressing through the rounds until a Grand Finalist is decided.
The losers of the quarter finals enter the losers bracket and play through that bracket against other losing players until one team remains. The two remaining individuals will then contest the Grand Final.
In the Archon Mode, two Chinese players have been drawn against two International players in the Semi Finals, with a Winners Final and Losers Final played to decide which teams will contest the Grand Final.
This promises to be an intriguing competition between eight of the best individual players as well as a fascinating insight into how players can double up and compete in Archon mode. Betting will be available on this event throughout next week until the on the 21st November.
Since: August 10, 2015
