Another weekend, and another two BSL groups!

Now, we're looking at groups C and D, to see who will join Dandy, XuanXuan, Gypsy and Boa in the Ro8. So far, we have no zergs, but at least group C might give us some more diversity.

In fact, group C starts us off with a zvz from the get-go, between the two players who have duopolized the fourth place spot the past three seasons. Avi-Love got fourth in season 11, while Sziky held on to the most bittersweet spot in seasons 12 and 13. Both players are looking to improve upon their best finish so far, however, they're in for quite the challenge.

Rounding out our opening day, we have Dewalt – one of the strongest candidates to win the tournament, and Xin, another Chinese protoss player who comfortably won his Ro24 group. Thus, we're starting off with two mirror matchups – followed by two rounds of Zerg vs Protoss.

Taking a more in depth look at our opening matchup, the Zerg vs Zerg between Sziky and Avi-Love. This game does have a pretty clear favorite, although it's probably not quite as decided as Avi himself would have you believe. Avi is no fan of the matchup, frequently preferring to opt for hydralisk based play, while Sziky's zvz is absolutely top notch, and he has the best mutalisk micro in the foreign scene. However, while Avi is no fan of the matchup, his Zerg vs Zerg performance in the BSL has actually been quite stellar. In fact, he got this far through having defeated Crossy 3-0 – another Zerg player with fantastic mutalisk control. His overall BSL record in ZvZ is 8-3 – by far his best matchup. Sziky, on his side, reknown for his ZvZ, has a rather unimpressive 6-6 record. Looking into it however, you do see that there's a difference in the calibur of their opponents, and a difference in how good their respective shapes have been. Sziky's losses are against eonzerg twice, trutacz twice, gorynich once, and he gave one walkover. Adding to it, most of these games happened quite a while ago, at a point where he was not playing at his best performance.

Avi only has one BSL game against the aforementioned three players, and that's a loss to eonzerg. Other than that, he has an 8-2 record against players I'm inclined to believe Sziky would go 10-0 against. Now, having covered that, and looking more at the matchup itself, Avi generally fares extremely well in the mind game department. When one player consistently gets the build order advantage, at some point, it stops being a coincidence. I can see it happen that in terms of the generic rock paper scissor element of ZvZ, where roughly speaking, there's a 9p > 12h > 12p > 9p thing going, Avi might find himself on the fortunate end of things in all games. Most likely, Sziky is not going to open 12h, as that's the one opening that outright kills you. Avi, on his side, recognizing that he needs an advantage, will open either 12p (ish), if he assumes Sziky is 9pooling, or 12h, if he gambles that Sziky is 12pooling. Avi has also had a couple amazing ZvZ games featuring hydras in the BSL. In particular, if he himself opens 12p against an opponent going 9pool, that might be an option, especially if the 9pooling zerg is too aggressive with his units, and not permitting himself enough time to drone.

However, I don't picture that working out this time. I've faced Sziky in the ladder and attempted to go hydra off a 12p opening. Suffice to say, I got slaughtered. His mutalisk micro is just too damn good – to the point where I don't picture that Avi can really win an air battle, even with their openings benefitting our glorious danish representative.

Concluding, I think Avi will come out swinging with some clever gamble. It might even work out. But then, he'll still end up losing the series, most likely going out with a 0-2.

Dewalt vs Xin
Our other opening matchup is Dewalt against Xin. Here, I have less history to go based on. Xin has played one best of three PvP series in the BSL, where he defeated Gosudark 2-1. Aside from that, he has a 1-0 win against Jiren under his belt. Dewalt on his end has had plenty introduction by now. He's been one of the two best players of the foreign scene for much of the duration of Starcraft:Remastered, duking it out against Bonyth for the top position. In my opinion, Dewalt overtook him sometime during the latter end of 2021, even if Bonyth still has a slight upper hand when the two face off in PvP.

Last season, Dewalt reached the finals without dropping a single game. He went 10-0 against Sziky, Ultra, Hawk and Gypsy, for then to lose 1-4 against Mihu, in a series where he was clearly frustrated and failed to perform at his top level. I'm confident he's aiming even higher this season, and to me, he's one of the big favorites to win the entire tournament.

Now, all the Chinese players are obviously strong players. Xin, however, did not look convincing to the point where I think he'll be able to handle Dewalt. In fact, I think Xin was very fortunate to even beat Gosudark – there was a point of their final game where Gosudark had a 9 against 5 dragoon engagement, with low ground miss chance being the equalizer that allowed Xin to survive. Xin's first victory stemmed from both players going DT, but Xin's cannons finishing just in time to hold. (Gosudark's win also involved dark templars, just for the record.)

Still, that's not gonna suffice against Dewalt. Dewalt's timings are crisp, and his decision making is on point. I recently saw a game of his where his observers actually were a bit late – but then, he held on by making three emergency shield batteries to buy himself time. To beat him PvP, normally, you have to rely on beating him in a goon reaver vs goon reaver battle. It's conceivable that Xin is a master of this, and that I just haven't seen it, but I find it unlikely.

I see this opening match also ending with a 2-0 victory, this time, for Dewalt.

That will leave us with a winner's match of Dewalt against Sziky, and a loser's match of Avi-Love against Xin. Sziky's ZvP is fantastic. Last season, we saw him conquer Bonyth, beating him 3-1 in the Ro8. However, Dewalt has been his cryptonite, having a 7-0 BSL record against him. Three months ago, the two also played a Deathfate Duel Series, a bo9 where all 9 games were played. Dewalt ended up winning 9-0. Consequently, even though my impression is that Sziky is in fantastic shape, having reached the magical 2700 MMR barrier during the ladder stage, Dewalt is going to win this round too, and most likely 2-0.

The elimination match, of Avi vs Xin, is way more exciting, at least on paper. Avi actually did take a game from Dewalt during the ro24 stage. Again, even though the BSL record shows Avi with an 8-3 record from ZvZ and a 4-8 record from ZvP, ZvP is his stronger matchup. His understanding of build orders and when to drone is really on point, and he tends to emerge from the early-mid game stage in a great position. At the same time, he's also dangerous, being willing to pull the trigger and fully allin, if an opportunity arises – or if he's just feeling like it. Being honest, I think this matchup might be such an occasion, where he'll feel the desire to go allin, even if it ends up not being the wisest choice. If the opening two rounds go the way I think they do – and I'm a lot more confident in my prediction for this group than I was last week – then Avi knows that beating Xin will lead to him going up against either Sziky, again, or against Dewalt – again.

For Xin, I have exactly one PvZ game to base my analysis based on, and while he looked pretty good, it also didn't blow me out of the water. These two should be fairly evenly matched, and depending on Avi's mood, we'll either get a good series of games, or 2-3 fairly quick allins.
I don't have a clear favorite, however, I believe that whomever wins, will end up falling in the decider's match, most likely against Sziky, but possibly against Dewalt.

Final prediction: Dewalt advances in first place, Sziky in second. Out of all four groups, this is the one I am most confident in.

Dewalt and Sziky Advance to the Ro8!

Group D(eath) is a juicy way to conclude the round of 16. Featuring the all time king of BSL, four time winner Bonyth, as well as current champion Mihu, this group promises to deliver. Adding to it is fan favorite Kwark, whose well-thought out build orders, strategies and tactics can be a foil to mostly any players, and Zhanhun, whom I'm hearing Chinese players claim to be the best Chinese Protoss, and this group is poised to deliver fireworks.

Starting us off is Mihu vs Kwark. Mihu has entered the 'non-Chinese foreign scene' with style, beating our best players in bo9 showmatches, and winning the first season of BSL he participated in. He's a mechanically strong player who tends towards getting a very solid economy going before his aggression kicks in, but who at that point ends up being quite relentless. One element I noticed from last season was just how good his positioning was when attacking – always utilizing the terrain favorably, in ways that consistently gave him very cost efficient fights. Adding to it that his mechanics and understanding of the game are both superb, and we're dealing with one of the favorites to take down the tournament.

Kwark on his end, seems to have become a bit faster as of late, now frequently hitting 150 apm in his games. Reknown for being slow, he is incredibly efficient and has developed his style of play to accommodate his mechanical ability. While he cannot execute a Dewalt-style shuttle-templar-zealot bomb-heavy playstyle with constant harassment and excellent macro to go along with it, he works around this deficiency through developing build orders aimed to hit very strong timings, and later on, making smart choices with his armies. In the PvT matchup, this includes a strong affinity for variants of bulldog, a 'fake 12 nexus' where he attempts to trigger a counter but neglects probes for units – or fairly standard play with a focus on larger amounts of stargate units. If Kwark goes arbiter, he's not aiming to have two, he'll happily keep making them to stasis 30 units in a battle. If he goes carrier, he's not aiming for 4 carriers to assist his ground army, but 16 carriers to be able to pressure two different fronts at the same time. He takes smart fights, knows which armies beat which armies, and makes many smart choices to lessen the impact of his comparably poor mechanical ability.

Still, looking at this matchup, I fear Kwark falls short. Mihu has generally opened very safely in TvP, although we did see him fall to TT1's aggression in one game on Aztec. I think Kwark's hope lies here, in that he might take an initial win through a double shuttle bulldog or some other type of wild allin, for then to play extra greedily against a paranoia-struck Mihu in game two. However, most likely, the difference in mechanical ability will end up being too much for our North American European representative. I predict a 2-0 win for Mihu, but I can certainly picture Kwark taking one game. Him winning the series would be a big upset, but again, within the realm of possibility.

Out second game is Bonyth against Zhanhun. Bonyth's PvP is the stuff of legend, as it is a matchup greatly determined by your ability to micro reavers and dragoons. In a Marvel universe, that would be listed as his superpower. Zhanhun is to me somewhat of an enigma, but I've heard him described as the best Chinese protoss player. If that is the case, then his level should be comparable to Bonyth overall – but, as seen with Dewalt, who is arguably overall stronger than Bonyth, this overall strength is not necessarily conclusive in a PvP matchup.

I predict we see a 2-1 going Bonyth's way, with a close, tight set of games.

That would give us a Mihu vs Bonyth winner's game, and a Kwark vs Zhanhun loser's game.

Now, Mihu and Bonyth have played a fair amount by now, and Mihu tends to emerge victorious something like 60% of the time. Conclusively, I think predicting a 2-1 victory going his way makes sense. Bonyth normally opts for his regular brand of PvT, harassment, reavers and carriers galore, and depending on map and how successful he is with the harassment, he gets a fair amount of wins.

Kwark against Zhanhun sounds quite strongly in favor of Zhanhun. Kwark is not confident in his goon reaver against goon reaver, and tends to opt for templar tech, sometimes dts, sometimes skipping the dts to go straight into storm, but Protoss vs Protoss against top level opponents is probably his biggest weakness. I picture an entertaining set of games – but one where Zhanhun ends up winning 2-0.

That would give us a Bonyth vs Zhanhun rematch – although with a reasonable chance of Mihu vs Zhanhun instead. In either case, I'm essentially guessing that Zhanhun loses, not having enough knowledge to analyse how he will perform.

There is also a chance we get Bonyth against Kwark at some point – if either Kwark beats Mihu or Bonyth loses to Zhanhun, or if Kwark beats Zhanhun in a loser's game. In that case, I recall reading Kwark claim that Bonyth can beat him while sharing vision, and I'll use that knowledge to predict Bonyth winning 2-0 in a competition where he wouldn't be self-handicapping in such a manner.

Mihu and Bonyth advancing – but with a big asterix next to Zhanhun's name, as I honestly don't know enough about him to say whether he can take down either of these two.

Mihu and Bonyth to Advance to the Ro8!

---

Writers: Liquid`Drone
Graphics: v1
Editors: BLinD-RawR