Fresh season, fresh blood:

Armless' Team

The most talented of the 3 Spanish clans, Armless' swept away last years 2nd tier opponents to finish top of their league. Household names such as vara and Guito will give their opponents cause for concern. Although probably not as strong as previous premier Spanish clans- such as the EoD team that took knife to a cup final replay- a mid-table finish would be respectable for this squad.

Coldspell

A clan that- if I remember correctly- dates back to 2.0 days; Coldspell are finally given a shot at the big league. Led by Magpie, Coldspell may struggle in this league, but I'm a strong believer that in this stage of NS's life, the skill gaps are starting to close so no team should be under-rated. This squad may well look up to ex-Levitacus player Kylma who has lots of experience at this level.

el'pheer

Another old team, the el'pheer players of days gone by have gone on to become some of the most talented players in NS. Unfortunately, over the past year el'pheer have struggled to keep their squad at the same "nightmare skilled" level. Nevertheless, they still have some top players with the likes of ContagiouS and Trigu. Indeed, teams beware of el'pheer's early alien round, as they can rely on Trigu to cause a lot of marine headaches with his lerk. And if they can keep cohesion, they shouldn't ever have a problem field a 6-man team with an incredible 17-man roster.

epic

This season's version of lucky sees a fair amount of changes. Although the loss of the deadly aim of zaCK will come as a bit of a blow, they have managed to recruit 2 levitacus players in Hopeanuoli and Tane. They have also added, in my eyes, this season's hottest prospect in zharp, a player who joins from the recently deceased omgwtfns? clan. In purple they have arguably one of the best commanders in NS (and a sexy gorge) so their marine round will be the highlight of their game. Their alien round isn't quite as strong, but they still have the necessary speciality classes covered. Expected fades are Hopeanuoli and Fera, with the lerking going to be taken up by purple of zharp. In the unlikely event that lucky actually manage to finish a season, they could well have a top 3 position at the end.

Flatline-Ns

I've always been impressed with Flatline. If memory serves, they have had a top-2 finish in the last 2 seasons of division 2. They rely on a solid, team performance as opposed to a speciality player carrying them. As skipjack and syl have gone inactive, their roster has been depleted to the minimum of 6 players. Obviously, this is a worry if one member fails to show up (d'uh!) but I've always been of the opinion that the smaller squad is better. You learn how to play off your team-mates, and it builds up a sort of camaraderie- and this fits Flatline's stly of play perfectly. Nevertheless, Flatline will find it hard in this divison, though I don't expect them to finish bottom, I would be mightily suprised if they came away with honours.

knife

Euros elite, the signs looks ominous for the opposition this year. Any squad who has come close to displacing knife in recent years have died- lessthanthree (who did succeed in beating them), Insane and Levitacus. After their revival, they have kept their policy of recruiting the creme of Europe. As well as the core players, recent recruits include France's "nicest guy in NS" tutu, and "I need your meds to live" dux. Dux in particular has come on leaps and bounds this year. He's always been a top player, but now he's in that league of "stop killing me?!" marines- so long as his commander keeps medding him. Unfortunately- he's still Welsh. It's this point that we need the obligatory mention of morphz. I feel that if he wanted to, he could walk over the pools of water in the maps if he wanted to. The most recent mop adventure is the the s3 ENSL final between knife and Levitacus on tanith. Breaking off from his squad at system waypointing, the lad rambos to their hive at cargo, and keeps the entire team back for a good minute or two. It's not a question of "is mop going to kill him?" as it is "which weapon is he going to use to kill him?". Of course- at this level you don't have one-man teams. The star-studded line-up has world-class players in every area. Players I have yet to mention include Fana as marine, wltrs and pantsu as fade and b1 as commander and skulk. In my view, their sole weakness is lack of a natural lerk. Having said that, I don't ever remember them having that kind of lerk (use comments section to correct me- but off the top of my head, previous lerks include Oetel, evilness, frG and Fana) and they've almost always been the best. Put this down to skulks such as b1 and wltrs, and sexy teamwork.

lessthanthree

lessthanthree had the advtange of being under-rated when they beat knife to top several moons ago. No-one will make that mistake this time as they have kept their core players- such as aA, avl, ben and buggy. Obviously, to fill the void that their inactivity caused they had to recruit some new players. SlayerX will give aA some Polish company, tmk will be... complaining about something (joke!), danster will show them what West Midlands players are made of, and PhOeNiX will be the most gifted player in the squad, despite being Natural Selection's only ginger player. With the loss of Levitacus, lessthanthree will most likely be the closest challengers to knife (bar the possibiliy of epic). Can they repeat their feat of beating knife? Much as I like to see this kind of competition for top honours, I don't think they can. Although a lot of players are racking up their e-cool points by saying "knife aren't as strong as they used to be", I believe knife are still top dogs in EUNS, and considering their inactivitiy, it would take something special for lessthanthree to finish first. But that is far from being a foregone conclusion. Both sides of their game are strong. On the marine side: buggy to com, with the UK players of avl, danster and PhOeNiX being a strong trio. On the alien side, buggy as lerk and PhOeNiX as main fade is without doubt the strongest line-up; but there is leeway for the second fade: avl, ben and SlayerX are all fit for the role. Expect a top-3 finish.

Semper Fi

s&m are effectively a new squad this year. A large and constantly changing roster set them back in season 3, but this year only Coldspell, Flatline and epic have a smaller squad. Led by lump and sherpa, the most notable transfers into the squad include Ed|Rush and genz. The loss of PhOeNiX is a huge blow to them, and they will be looking to the in-form lagga to fill in his shoes. In Sublime, they have one of Europe's best ever lerks. Indeed, this should be his most challenging year yet- the re-emergance of buggy finally means that Sublime has competition to be recognised as the best player in that role. Although they will struggle against the likes of knife, anything less than a mid-table finish will be considered a failure by Semper.