Round 7 (Losers bracket)
Shoka (45) VS. (55) Sabella - Very interesting series between a really solid overall player and a surging SM player here. Shoka has shown a level of tier competency through qualifying and making it this far, but he does seem to fallback on stall, which is not particularly good anymore, and his ability to form solid teams by himself in SM is something I am personally unsure of. With this said, I think he is a slightly better player than Sabella overall if only because he has had a bit more sustained success and he has been around for years. With that said, Sabella is no pushover obviously, doing well in snake and making it very far in the winner's bracket, so I expect him to put up a fight, but I really think that his main advantage is in in terms of preparation and team comfort, so if he takes full advantage of this, then I see him coming out on top and as of late, he has been doing so. Overall, his unconventional offensive style with a splash of random Chansey Zapdos Kartana balance tends to find openings to manipulate those who simply do not have a complete grasp on the tier, so I find this to be a plausible outcome. Given that there is some dependence on Shoka's own preparation and Sabella being consistent here, it's far from a sure thing, but I'll give the slight edge to Sabella.
Empo (45) VS. (55) Cdumas - It's funny, really. People seem to keep underestimating Empo as a player and builder despite him putting up pretty consistent individual results with fairly unique teams. I guess there is a bit of a stigma behind his name, but I truly believe that he is solid and can compete with just about anyone in SM/ORAS (results have sorts shown this in individual tours, too). I think that Cdumas is the clear favorite regardless because he just keeps fucking winning against everyone in Snake, OLT, WCOP, etc., but this will be much closer than most think. Empo took the series off of Ojama and managed to get this far for good reason and I am impressed by him. Cdumas is still the real deal and one of the favorites to win the entire tour, so I think he will take it in three close ones.
gl dudes