What to expect from Complexity v. NIP

After a fairly disappointing loss to NAVI in their 2024 opener, Complexity will look to bounce back with a win over NIP. Considering the Swedish-Spanish-Danish-Ukrainian jigsaw puzzle hasn't shown much of anything under Alejandro "alex" Masanet's leadership, Complexity need to head into this series expecting a 2-0. Anything less than that would be a disappointment, and a loss would and should start to give rise to questions about COL's funk that started at ESL Challenger Atlanta.

JT was our top-rated player?

One of the more striking data points from COL's loss to NAVI was the underperformance of players like Jonathan "EliGE" Jablonowski and Håkon "hallzerk" Fjærli. That simply cannot stand if COL want to make a deep run in Copenhagen.

• EliGE needs to get his numbers up

• The eye test for hallzerk against NIP needs to be better than what we saw against NAVI

• JT outfragging alex is one area COL shouldn't be concerned about

When will NIP arrive to 2024?

Due to having a spot in the RMR, NIP haven't really started their year yet in tier one, having only played a few matches here and there, and it shows. With their debut against G2 being completely one-sided, all systems don't seem to be a go in the NIP camp. Complexity might be able to abuse this if they can't rely on their own players to frag out just yet.

• REZ was the main bright light for NIP against G2, having an even K-D and a 1.19 rating

• headtr1ck went missing with only 20 kills in the series and can't afford to as NIP's star AWPer

• es3tag needs to justify his return to the roster, and a 0.50 rating isn't a great start

Previous Matchups

When NIP last played COL they had Hampus "hampus" Poser and Ludvig "Brollan" Brolin so we can't really look to the past to predict the future.

Likely Vetoes

As always, these vetoes come with the caveat that they are highly speculative as they depend on whether Complexity, as the higher ranked team, chooses to pick first or ban last.

• NIP ban Anubis (1 Map Played)

• Complexity ban Mirage (0 Maps Played)

• NIP pick Overpass (73% Winrate)

• Complexity pick Nuke (50% Winrate)

• Decider could be Ancient (Commonly played by both teams)

Analysis: Overall the veto has a good chance of going in a different direction because alex's iteration of NIP has relatively few maps played and the team has just come out of the player break.

Additionally, NIP could float Anubis, as they did versus G2, considering COL have been struggling on it recently, or pick into Ancient earlier knowing COL are likely to pick Overpass if given the chance.