Los Angeles Gladiators vs Philadelphia Fusion

For our first match of the day we have an incredibly exciting clash between the Los Angeles Gladiators and the Philadelphia Fusion. After four insane weeks filled with surprises, upsets and colossal swings in the standings (Boston and Houston falling out of the Top 6) we're down to a fight between the third and fifth best teams in the Overwatch League.

For the Los Angeles Gladiators this is an incredibly important match and they're looking to dominate. Based on whether or not they dominate in week five depends on whether or not they will be third or second in the playoffs. They're also not locked in either as Seoul Dynasty is right on their tail with the exact same win/loss record but a worse map differential. (-3) If they manage to win both matches this week and have a good enough map score they will reach the Top 3 and fight for the $125.000 prize.

Regardless of what happens, the Gladiators have a very high chance of finishing at least third - if everything goes "according to plan" and that is an incredible achievement for a team that struggled in the middle of the rankings last stage. Their week four wins over the Los Angeles Valiant (4-0) and the London Spitfire (3-1) speak volumes about their improvements and the fact that the addition of Fissure to their tank lineup did wonders overall. The amount of aggression that he brings and the space that he creates for his team fully allows his carries to shine - we've rarely seen Surefour, Asher and Hydration dominate as hard as they did over the past two weeks. He is their biggest catalyst and an incredible one - he is allowing others to reach their full potential while still maintaining some of the best Winston stats in the entire League.

As for Philadelphia, Stage 2 has been a strange journey. They're currently sitting at fifth place with a seemingly adequate five wins and three losses however over the last four weeks they never took down a top tier team. They reverse swept the Houston Outlaws however in hindsight that isn't such a big achievement, they only managed to take down teams beneath them in the rankings and take a single map off of Seoul and New York. They've been fairly inconsistent when facing top tier opposition, however they often manage to muscle out and overwhelm teams with a lower amount of coordination and synergy.

They're an incredibly capable team however they failed to compete at the highest possible level - at least for now. They've also given EQO far more play time when compared to ShadowBurn for reasons unknown - EQO is perhaps more consistent in his brilliance but ShadowBurn never failed to hardcarry in those incredibly important, last second clutch moments. They've also started with Snillo last week as they were against bottom tier teams so they dodged showing anything new and they're entering tomorrow's match with their cards close to the chest.

This is an incredibly tough match to call as both teams showed incredible potential over the course of the Overwatch League. Philadelphia especially has the upper hand - at least in theory as no one knows their starting lineup. The Gladiators on the other hand looked unstoppable over the last two weeks and they've even managed to take down London in a somewhat dominant 3-1 showing so their improvement is far from a placebo effect. The "Fissure effect" is real and we still haven't seen them fully tested as even the Spitfires failed to come up with a counter.

We're going with the Gladiators here but at the end of the day it should be an insanely close series that could go the five map distance.