Shanghai Dragons vs Los Angeles Gladiators

For the second match of the day we have a clash between the Los Angeles Gladiators and the Shanghai Dragons. Now the Chinese squad didn't show a lot during the preseason. Other than a couple of standout moments by their DPS Diya and Undead they failed to put up much of a fight.

That is somewhat understandable however as the Shanghai Dragons arrived to Los Angeles just a single day before the preseason began. To top it all off they weren't able to scrim any other Overwatch League team during the whole month heading into the preseason so it's fair to say that the Dragons haven't shown their full potential. Overall they're a highly skilled roster but seeing how other teams played during the preseason, it's hard giving them any benefit of the doubt. They could develop further down the road, but they would need to make a couple of big changes to their starting lineup as they certainly didn't sign the best players that the Chinese Overwatch community has to offer.

On the other hand we have a somewhat perplexing Los Angeles Gladiators roster that had a fairly confusing preseason run. First they dominated over London Spitfire (over both the GC Busan and KongDoo rosters) but then failed to show anything worth mentioning against the Los Angeles Valiant. It's hard pinpointing their realistic strength at the moment, as we need to see them tested before coming to any concrete conclusion. That said, even though the GC Busan roster failed to adapt to the current meta, beating both Korean rosters in their first preseason outing is a very promising sign for the second Los Angeles team in the Overwatch League.

To make matter even more interesting, Bischu was sick during the preseason so the Gladiators ended up going with a triple DPS team comp which isn't the most efficient at the moment. Luckily, they have some solid DPS talent on the roster between Hydration, Asher and fan favorite Surefour. To top it all off, they have one of the better and most in-sync support duos in Shaz and BigGoose - two players that they've imported from Europe's Team Gigantti.

This will be a very simple but important test for the Gladiators as they're currently predicted to be just outside of the top 6, and thus the playoffs. If they are able to play up to their preseason level and perhaps even improve, then we're in for a very exciting fight for that last playoffs spot.

Betting on the Los Angeles Gladiators would be the safer choice.