EG looked shaky today, there's no denying it. A narrow victory over Druidz and the obvious disaster against fnatic can in no way be disguised by their solid win versus TCM.EU in the lower bracket. But, like TEK9, EG are very capable of taking one bad day in their stride and following it up with a great one. The Canadian side's weakness on mp_strike is well documented - recent defeats to Nexus and Pandemic will attest to that - but any European side that underestimates them in the lower bracket tomorrow will live to regret it. I picked EG out as a strong contender to reach the final earlier today and I stand by that prediction.

Those rolling out the old "EU > NA" arguments are also, as usual, wide of the mark. EG should be commended for even turning up to this event, as should the team's management for making it possible. Competing on foreign soil is tough for any team and the statistics will back this up. It's no coincidence, for example, that in Call of Duty 2 only one non-Scandinavian team won a LAN in Scandinavia and no Scandinavian team ever won one outside Scandinavia. EG entered the world of the unknown this weekend and have proven themselves up to the task of matching Europe's best. One bad result doesn't change this.

"I didn't expect as large of a loss but whatevs you just gotta roll with it" says Chris "ntt" Gillett on the fnatic match. "We aren't too great on strike but all credit to fnatic they outplayed us on it. For the longest time we haven't been able to get a real grasp of the map, just can't figure it out.. pandemic, nexus and now fnatic have shown us we need some large restructuring" he admits.

EG were shellshocked as fnatic rounded off the 13:3 whitewash and, with less than half an hour before their next match, needed to clear their minds. Team manager Brian Dunn sat the players down and together they pieced together what had gone wrong. "fnatic just kept pushing them hard and they couldn't adapt in time" Dunn explains,"they'd start off with two or three kills and we'd fight back but then they won almost every 2v2 or 3v3".

"In close rounds we found ourselves on the losing side many times" Gillett chips in. "Ted had a great 2v1 and missed the deef by a millisecond, was a heartbreaker" he ruefully recalls. Even in defeat, the Canadians retain their positive attitude and humor. And as for whether the result would have been different on another map? Gillett laughs, "we definitely feel a lot more confident on others" he says, "but you never know until youre in that match fraggin'. Maybe we'll get another shot and find out".

fnatic would do well to be wary should that situation arise, EG may enjoy a joke but they mean business here. They face 4Kings next in the lower bracket on mp_crash, the same map they beat TEK9 on last night. 4K might fancy their chances but, based on what we've seen from them so far here, are unlikely to end EG's run in the tournament. A win versus 4Kings would earn EG a place in the top six, but even that is unlikely to satisfy them, let alone the fans back home.