This week we are going to Monza.

This time there is no sprint race here. This is one of the weakest races for Verstappen. I mean that he has no history with a win here. The last winner of this GP was Gasly if you remember his delightful rivalry with Sainz for the win. Before that there was another awesome rivalry among Leclerc, Hamilton and Bottas which resulted in a Leclerc win. This is the home GP for Ferrari also of course. Maybe it might be finally time for a Ferrari driver (especially Leclerc) to win here. Ferrari are still dealing with durability issues but this is a really important race for the team. This might be a race that we watch a great rivalry between Leclerc and Verstappen for the win.

How interesting it is that these races are following each other in the calendar.    It's a nice coincidence to see two important races for these two great drivers this often.

It was a really dangerous day for NaVi indeed. They could have even been out of the tournament if Spirit defeated Vitality. This was quite probable normally as Vitality didn't need any win after guaranteeing their lead in the group. This is a big lesson for NaVi I hope. They have s1mple also but there is something different with their team play recently. I wonder how they weakened this much suddenly.

Group B matches are going to start in only two days. FaZe are the absolute favourite team to finish the group as the leader of course. But I won't be 100% sure of it after seeing how bad NaVi did in the group stage.    Outsiders have been dropping down in the ranking for some time. However I still see them a very dangerous opponent for every team in the group. We shouldn't forget that OG defeated FaZe in Blast Premier not much time ago. Outsiders are not much different than OG. G2 might be eliminated in this stage already by finishing it in the 4th position I assume. They need to make a big improvement after their poor performance in Blast Premier.

@FanEagle  According to the source below, Ancelotti has announced that he will retire when his Real Madrid career is over. It means that we will see him at least for two more years at Real Madrid. As he is very successful with Real Madrid at the moment the team might try their best to convince him to extend his contract too. But even a 2-year time period is pretty good for Real Madrid. He is a great choice for this team and he proved this by two big titles last season.

In case Ancelotti leaves then I think that maybe we can see Zinedine Zidane back at the team. Because Real Madrid were doing great thanks to his management in the past. They won the Champions League three times in a row for example. This is always a very difficult job to do for every team. But Ancelotti still has a long contract with the team and maybe he can achieve the same success with Zidane in this tournament until his contract runs out.

https://www.goal.com/en/news/carlo-ancelotti-confirms-retire-end-real-madrid-career/bltacaf9fabe0d7c080

I think that this betslip might win today but I didn't bet on it so let's see if I'll miss a nice chance. The total odd is 2.05.

Actually all of the picks here are credible for these matches. Maybe only the Vitality - Spirit one is a little doubtful. Because Vitality have already guaranteed to finish the group at the 1st position. Spirit might use this for their advantage if they show a solid performance. So far they have been able to beat Endpoint and NIP. They couldn't win even one map against NaVi and fnatic. But like I said this isn't an important match for Vitality at all. Otherwise Vitality's odd would be lower than 1.40 for sure.

There were some very interesting incidents in this race even though it was a comfortable win for Verstappen.

The most striking one was Ferrari's huge failure about Sainz's pit. He was called to pit but there were only three tyres in the hands of the mechanics.    This unbelievable mistake caused Sainz to have a 12-second pit which caused him to lose important positions. Ferrari didn't make do with this of course. This time in Sainz's second pit, they released Sainz dangerously and this caused Sainz to get a 5-second penalty. Sainz finished the race at the 8th position as a result. Maybe it wasn't a good day for Leclerc as well but it was like a nightmare for Sainz surely.



This was how Ferrari released Sainz by the way and he touched Alonso's front wing also. Ferrari did this before too but they are still not learning their lesson.

Arsenal might be in some trouble as the conditions of some of their important players are still questionable. Odegaard, Ramsdale and Zinchenko might not be able to play today.

Odegaard started this season really effectively. He's made an important contribution by scoring 3 goals in 5 matches. Ramsdale has been a very reliable goalkeeper for Arsenal since the beginning of the season. He's made very crucial saves to help his team. Zinchenko has added a big strength to the team in their attacks especially. However the most important point for Arsenal is going to be to keep the same dedicated performance without looking at if they have missing players or not. If they manage to keep their usual team play then Manchester United's job can be very difficult despite playing in Old Trafford. Arsenal might not be the same as Liverpool I mean. Manchester United will need to keep a high level of performance in both halves unlike their last matches.

Messi could have signed for Manchester City also. If he showed some interest in them I think that Guardiola would have liked to work with his old student again. Manchester City had a very familiar game plan with Barcelona's in the end. This would have meant a lot for Messi as he wouldn't have any adaptation problem. He would be playing in the best league in the world also. But he still chose to go to PSG and Neymar must have played a big role in this. Neymar was even ready to hand the number 10 to Messi but Messi rejected it.

As for Mbappe his motivation was of course money. Because PSG offered a contract that none of the players in the world could imagine. It is too difficult to reject conditions like this so Mbappe did the same. His dream team must be still Real Madrid but after this contract he might postpone his departure to a date which is quite far from now.

It looks like we were thinking the quite opposite for this matchup and my prediction won. I'm sorry for your loss as Spirit couldn't fight back against fnatic well on both maps. Nuke was already a very obvious win for fnatic after the picks. I was even surprised about why Spirit didn't ban the map which fnatic were the best (9 wins in 9 matches). Mirage was a more balanced one for the teams but fnatic got even a more solid win like 16-9. I also thought that Spirit would win one map at least but they didn't have a good day.

fnatic are playing really big these days by defeating teams that have higher rankings than them. fnatic are very likely to move on in this tournament too considering the matches tomorrow. Because they are playing against Endpoint while Spirit are having one of the toughest matches of the group against Vitality.

I knew it like Verstappen's gearbox was changed and he was going to start from the back of the grid. However it seems like Verstappen is starting in pole position. Am I wrong about this now? Because there are so many different news and I really don't know what to believe. Some websites are showing the starting grid as Verstappen in pole.

Anyway, it was a really great qualifying session. Leclerc and Verstappen had a beautiful competition for the pole position. Leclerc's second sector was really bad on his last try and Verstappen benefited from this a lot by stealing the lead from him. However Leclerc still seems very quick now which could be a sign for a very competitive race tomorrow. Unless Ferrari have bad strategies he can really fight with Verstappen for the win this time.

Perez had a spin on his last try and missed the chance of rising on the grid more. This is bad news for Red Bull but we will see how dedicated Perez will be after starting in 5th position.

This is today's program in the ESL Pro League.

There is already a match going on between NIP and Endpoint by the way. This can be the biggest opportunity for NIP to get their first win in the group. Endpoint are still an unpredictable team after seeing the win they got against NaVi. Both teams are about to lose on the maps they picked currently. NIP's performance on Vertigo was really amazing. They didn't give any round to their opponent while playing on T side. Now Endpoint are advantageous to make the score 1-1 on Inferno. The decider map is Mirage and NIP have a big experience on this map. Maybe they don't have a successful past on this map but their experience might be useful to win 2-1 at the end.

For the rest of the matches today, my picks are fnatic @1.71 and NaVi @1.48. fnatic - Spirit can be a really competitive match but there is a big improvement in fnatic's performance lately. I think they are strong enough to beat Spirit even if they lose one map. As for NaVi - Vitality, NaVi are very clearly the favourite team to win despite being aware of Vitality's recent effort. Vitality are having big difficulties against them as we saw it recently too. Maybe they can win one map but I expect no more than that.

I was feeling pretty sure about Verstappen to win this race but the gearbox issue was unexpected. Maybe he will start from the back of the grid after changing the gearbox but there is still nothing finished for him at the same time. He is still too quick for any driver on the grid now. Even the odds are favouring him too much for the win:



As far as I remember he is seen as even more favourite than the last race. Maybe it is related to its being the home race for Verstappen. This can be an even more interesting race to watch as he will have a big challenge ahead of him. Starting as the last and finishing the first is a very difficult task for any driver even if they have the best car on the grid. For example Hamilton did this before but it isn't a common incident to be seen anyway. I'm just thinking about betting on Leclerc @4.60 and try my luck with him. He has a big chance ahead if Ferrari don't mess up things.

There is an incredibly big power difference among Plzen and the rest of the teams in the group. Plzen are the weakest link of the group of course. The only thing they can do is to play a defensive game against all of their opponents. Because none of the other teams have a weak attacking line.

Sometimes this kind of teams can make surprises against big teams in the Champions League. For example, Sheriff Tiraspol did this against Real Madrid. They beat Real Madrid in Bernabeu which was really an unbelievable result. The biggest thing Plzen can do in this group would be nothing more than this. They should be happy even if they get one point. Because Barcelona and Inter are also in a great shape this season. Stealing points from any of them is going to be a very difficult job for Plzen.

NaVi's losing to Endpoint by 2-0 was a big shock indeed. b1t had a bad day today. He had only 10 kills in both matches and he was the bottom fragger on the second map. Maybe s1mple needs to take a bigger responsibility in the team like the old times. On Ancient, NaVi couldn't win a single round on T side while Endpoint were getting 8 rounds. They were really inadequate about defending Endpoint on CT side of Dust2 also. If they are having this serious issues against a much worse opponent then there are some issues to solve clearly.

Spirit were really solid on Mirage against NIP and won by 16-9. magixx had a big role in this win by 25 kills. NIP should be able to beat them on Nuke but I'm not sure about the decider on Ancient. Spirit have a 60% win rate there and NIP have 25% after playing nearly the same time. I think NIP have a really difficult job against Spirit as a result. However they are desperately in need of a win now after starting with 0W 2L.

Mick Schumacher is leaving Ferrari Driver Academy at the end of this season. His connection with Ferrari is officially ending and it is sad to see a Schumacher doing this of course. However Mick's performance at Haas hasn't met the expectations so far. He made simple mistakes and had expensive crashes for his team. Haas are thinking of replacing him with a decent driver who can be Ricciardo as @FanEagle also mentioned. However I'd like to watch a driver like Ricciardo working for more competitive teams. This move would block the way for him to return to his old days.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/formula-1/mick-schumacher-ferrari-haas-f1-27877865?utm_source=linkCopy&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=sharebar

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FP1 has ended and seeing Mercedes drivers at the top made me feel interesting. In the recent times, Mercedes started to be able to compete with Ferrari at the same level. We saw Russell being faster than Leclerc and Sainz in the previous race. This is really alarming for Ferrari already now. It is early to talk about this race yet. But if we see Mercedes this powerful until the race then they might be ahead of Ferrari with both drivers this time.

I wasn't wrong about fnatic today. They really managed to win on Ancient by 16-14 and at least didn't give up earlier against NaVi. Starting 1-0 behind might make some other teams in trouble maybe but NaVi were quite cold-blooded about that. They won 16-8 on Mirage and 16-7 on Inferno. This was still a comfortable matchup for them in general. However this was a good sign about fnatic to reborn slowly again. If they continue to play well we can see them among tier 1 teams again after some time.

There was a big difference in s1mple's performance between Mirage and Inferno maps by the way. Even though he was very ineffective on Inferno, electroNic and Perfecto were there to carry the team. It is very important for NaVi to do this when s1mple plays inconsistently. This shows how capable they still are when he isn't in charge.

Even though Liverpool are shown as the second biggest candidate for winning the Champions League, I doubt them honestly. Because they have been struggling in the Premier League. Their performance is changing very often. For example after having a run without a win they destroyed Bournemouth 9-0. But right after that they hardly defeated Newcastle by a last minute goal. If we see this kind of a performance in the Champions League also then it is too hard for them to even make it to the final.

Klopp is searching for a way to fix the current issues. It is defense-related rather than offense as it seems. I wonder what have changed after that great season. van Dijk isn't injured but they still can't get ahead of conceding goals easily.

Tottenham really just destroyed a nice betslip. I wish I put BTTS as @igehhh thought. 

Tottenham were helpless in the second half especially. West Ham wasted many important chances. It was like an example of the Southampton - Manchester United match actually. But the only difference was that West Ham were able to score. Actually I didn't understand how Tottenham's performance dropped this much quickly. I knew that it was a derby match but West Ham looked really weak at the beginning of the season. Their effort in the Aston Villa match wasn't satisfying at all despite winning that. But Tottenham were even almost losing the match because of giving too much space in defense to them.

I was just shocked to see that result. NIP lost both maps by 16-4. Let's say I understand Ancient because of NIP's being really bad there. But Overpass was a very positive map for them. How can they lose that too by the same score? hampus was just terrible in this match. 4 and 5 frags on these maps were no help for the team. But I don't think that he was the main problem of course. They are still out-of-form as a team and this form can cause them to be out of top 10 in no time also.

NaVi - fnatic and NIP - Vitality are the remaining good matches of the day. Navi @1.22 and Vitality @1.43 are pretty nice options. Maybe fnatic's defeating a tier 1 team can increase their self-confidence but I think there is no way they are doing the same against NaVi. Maybe they can win one map by picking a map NaVi are relatively weak. Vitality should be able to get past a this much weak NIP comfortably also.

Gakpo and Simons are the most attention getting players for PSV now with 6 goals each. It really makes me feel like PSV have changed the roles with Ajax by this season. Because we have always seen Ajax winning matches by big goal differences like this. This might be a proof for PSV to be more challenging for the league title this time. Consistency is still going to play a key role of course and Ajax have been better at it so far.

The closest match between PSV and Ajax are on the 13th week. PSV can't defeat Ajax in the league since September 2018. If PSV manage to turn things around against Ajax then they can be much closer to the title. The results in big matches would determine the champion I believe. In addition, Feyenoord are also very impressive now. They are a candidate to be a tough opponent for PSV and Ajax both. But I don't think Feyenoord can maintain their title fight as much as those two.

I'm really surprised to see s1mple like this for some matches. Since he was gone and came back, he hasn't been like the s1mple we've known so far. We've been used to watching him carrying the team nearly in all of the matches. This time Perfecto and b1t did this job on each map.

However this play of s1mple on Nuke was really delightful. He got 4 AWP kills on bomb site B: https://clips.twitch.tv/CorrectTsundereBisonBCouch--KNOmoWK9QyL_pl7?tt_content=url&tt_medium=clips_api

It was an easy peasy match for Vitality also by 2-0. Endpoint weren't even close to their quality. Now we have a NIP - fnatic match which started moments ago. The map choices are Ancient, Overpass and Nuke. fnatic are playing great on Ancient and I believe they will win this map. NIP are most likely to win the next one. However as for the decider, fnatic might have a chance to beat their opponent because they have a 100% win rate on Nuke in 8 matches there. The only question mark is whether they will manage to beat a tier 1 team after a long time. The new roster is getting better but I still doubt this match a lot.