MaRc My Words
The Winter Majors continued last weekend with the Rocket League Championship Series heading to Europe. Shooting stats continued to tumble across the board, owing slightly to the usual suspects having to face off against more talented teams than in the regionals. In my top players of the week, the first on my list, however, kept it cool across his 41 games played.
5. YANIS “ALPHA54” CHAMPENOIS - TEAM VITALITY
Of their seven series, five went to the final game, and throughout it all Alpha54 managed to maintain an impeccable 3.20 shots per game, including this one off a passing play against Endpoint.
While this and the pass from the following clip in that video were solid, there was little else to credit Alpha for across the board, so let’s quickly move on to mister preflip.
4. MAELLO “AZTRAL” ERNST - OXYGEN ESPORTS
Here’s video of the preflip as well for anyone who hasn’t watched it already, I don’t know how you would have missed it but at least you’ve seen it now:
AztraL had a very comparable week to Alpha but the preflip shows a level of awareness some might have missed. That initial shot from Victor “Ferra” Francal was likely getting blocked by either of the Guild defenders, in any normal circumstance the most appropriate thing would be to rotate out, however, AztraL is a mechanical god and knows exactly how to place that ball too far in front of noly and a little behind David “Deevo” Morrow. Unfortunately for AztraL, Oxygen lost that series 2-4.
3. ARCHIE “ARCHIE” PICKTHALL - TOP BLOKES
The Top Blokes tied with Oxygen Esports but had a very shaky start, as they were narrowly denied a reverse sweep in the upper bracket by Dignitas. Archie put his teammates on his back and started dragging them towards the round of six with an astronomical 3.72 shots per game, the most of any player at the event, keeping his opponents backed up in their half for a long time also led to him getting an impressive 0.83 goals per game.
2. JOSEPH “NOLY” KIDD - GUILD ESPORTS
Sometimes though, you just need a sharp implement to get the job done, noly turned a very limited 2.79 goals per game into the highest goals per game of any player at the event with 0.96 (27 in 28 games). Perhaps unsurprisingly, his long time teammate Thomas “ThO” Binkhorst set him up the majority of the time, with 0.79 assists per game, also the highest of the event. I suppose this is the reason this pair has persisted through so many iterations of the roster.
1. MARC “MARC_BY_8” DOMINGO - TEAM BDS
Last, but not least (he’s at the top of the list in fact), sits one of the quieter members of Team BDS. Alex “Extra” Paoli and Evan “M0nkey M00n” Rogez often take the limelight, but not this time. MaRc took the most shots out of any BDS member and had a nice balance of 0.7 goals per games and 0.7 assists per game. Sometimes the support players go under the radar, but when they’re having a good week they can make their teams look terrifying (as if BDS weren’t good enough already).
The last major of the Winter Split, in North America, starts on Saturday at 4.30 GMT. Is that too far away for you? Don’t worry, there’s more news, interviews and features here at GGRecon!
Header Image via ZeeboDesigns