The first week of Street Fighter V kicked off Saturday night to mark the beginning of what’s clearly going to be an extremely competitive Season 4 of the Gfinity Elite Series Delivered by Domino’s!
Featuring an exciting best-out-of-seven format, Saturday night popped-off with new charismatic players and epic comebacks from Elite Series veterans as the final games of Week 1 kicked off. With Friday’s FIFA 19 and Saturday morning’s Rocket League matches behind them, SFV was the last opportunity for each franchise to bag a win in the opening week of Season 4.
Let’s get into the fighting spirit and look back at the results from Week 1:
exceL Esports vs Method
The first match saw Elite Series Season 1 champs exceL Esports return with their original line-up: Infexious, Hurricane and Brian. Method brought to the table some other familiar faces from Elite Series’ gone by, with ImStillDaDaddy, Packz and Broski representing.
As with FIFA and Rocket League, it was Method who secured the first win, as ImStillDaDaddy’s Guile took out Brian’s Blanka - perhaps a mistake from Brian, who usually opts for mystic Menat.
exceL brought it to a tie soon thanks to Hurricane’s Cammy, who got the better of Broski’s Dhalism, eventually closing out the match-ups with a 4-2 win, despite falling short in the first few rounds.
Reason Gaming vs Team Envy
Hands down, the best matches of the night.
Underdogs Reason Gaming faced Season 3 champs Team Envy, who have kept in place a large part of their undefeatable roster that won the title (minus TKR, who’s switched to the yellow-side with Team Vitality). Reason’s brand-spanking-new SFV team boasted Vegapatch, AngryMojsan and Gfinity Challenger Series draftee, Poizesto, who earned himself the man of the match award.
Poizesto showed great composure in dispatching Envy’s Layo and NassimClaw in his first two matches. His team-mates weren’t too shabby either, with Vegapatch pulling off a win against Mister Crimson, but coming a close second against NassimClaw, who performed a miracle escape to get the win.
Reason had the advantage and was one point away from winning the series, but the experienced NassimClaw narrowly beat Poizesto in his third match, and Mister Crimson took out AngryMojosan in the next encounter.
Once again, Envy started the season on a high note and will be one of the favourites for the title with their terrific trio. And that’s before they go to their bench for players like WillTuPac and Abdess.
Final score: 4-3 Envy
Epsilon Esports vs Fnatic
Having reached the S3 SFV finals, but ultimately losing to the unstoppable Nordavind, Fnatic return with a new young team in the hope of going one step further this season with fan favourite, Shakz, alongside Brick and Elite Draft pick Kilzyou.
The bad boys from Epsilon esports, Nasty Nas, Gunslinga and Isam are also a new team but gelled quickly.
The games were hugely competitive. There was even a bit of trash talking between Isam and Brick just to add a little extra spice. As with Envy and Reason, it came down to the last match between Shakz and Gunslinga. Baby faced assassin Shakz showed why he’s one of the best players in Europe with a stunning performance that won those valuable points for Fnatic.
It meant a much happier end to the first weekend for Fnatic who finally got their revenge against Epsilon, having been beaten in FIFA and Rocket League on Friday night and Saturday morning.
Final score: 4-3 Fnatic
Hashtag United vs ASUS ROG Army
The final game of the night was Hashtag vs ASUS ROG Army, and unfortunately for the Spanish team, it was Hashtag who once again set the pace early and got the win.
Hashtag’s SFV brothers, Jester and Jokerz, went up against Elite Series veterans like Shivs and JonesArcade, and once again, ASUS ROG did not have an answer for Hashtag’s style of play in SFV. They could only manage two wins and a week one defeat.
Final score: 4-2 Hashtag United
With week one now in the books, the Gfinity Elite Series Delivered by Domino’s continues next Friday when FIFA 19 returns. Don’t forget to join us next Saturday when the current champions, Nordavind, return to defend their title.
Get your FREE tickets to come and watch all the action in the Gfinity Arena here on Eventbrite, and you'll also be able to watch live exclusively on Facebook every single week:
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