The CSGO StarLadder Major continues, and we just had another day of best-of-one match-ups in Berlin. Today’s top results include Vitality on the rise, NRG catching Team Liquid off-guard, and Astralis starting to look sharp.
Team Liquid loses the CSGO derby against NRG
Perhaps the biggest upset yet in the New Legends stage, NRG have successfully defeated this year’s giants, Team Liquid. Most expected Team Liquid to swiftly deal with Tarik “tarik” Celik‘s side. However, Dust2 emerged to slowly drift towards NRG.
On the terrorist side, NRG initially got a hefty 7-1 lead before Liquid finally woke up to bring it close enough at the half at 9-6. However, NRG’s counter-terrorist side looked even more dangerous. A fantastic display of AWPing from Tsvetelin “CeRq” Dimitrov paired with a good overall team effort brought Team Liquid to their knees. The match ended with a score of 16-9 for NRG.
Keith “NAF” Markovic and Russel “Twistzz” Van Dulken were missed in their side’s effort, as Jonathan “EliGE” Jablonowski was the best player on the server. If the rest followed, we may have seen an entirely different score. Instead, NRG goes 2-0 while Team Liquid goes 1-1.
Vitality starting to catch fire, overwhelm FaZe
The #2 CSGO team in the world, Vitality, had a very poor start to the tournament at the New Challengers stage. Since then, they have commenced a noticeable rise in form. We are finally starting to see Mathieu “ZywOo” Herbaut and co. getting back into shape. It was indeed ZywOo that led his CSGO team to victory. However, the rest of the Vitality roster also had respectable performances and played up to par.
The French side gained a massive early lead with a 9-0 score on their ct-side. FaZe was only able to take two points at the half as Vitality denied the FaZe terrorists any room to breathe. The half went Vitality’s way at a massive 13-2. The second half kicked off with Vitality picking up the pistol. But FaZe immediately responded, this time as cts, and created themselves some hope for a comeback. Nikola “NiKo” Kovač‘s side failed to keep focus, however, and Vitality shut down the defense at a disappointing 16-7 score in favor of the French. Vitality move up 2-0 while FaZe continue fighting with a 1-1 score.
G2 fails to overcome Astralis on Nuke
G2 letting the map pick slip in cost them dearly, as the French struggled to put up a fight against Astralis on Nuke. The first half saw G2 put up quite the fight against the Danish side. G2 terrorists challenged Astralis, leading up to an initial score of 5-2. Then, Astralis adjusted accordingly and started to roll, making the half theirs at 8-7.
What happened in the second half was an absolute disaster for G2. Astralis left no room for a breather for the counter-terrorists. Tight rounds always went in favor of the Danish side. Ultimately, Astralis strung eight in a row, topping it all off with a failed defuse by G2, most likely caused by a miscommunication on the team. Emil “Magisk Reif and Nicolai “dev1ce” Reedtz looked especially sharp, getting key frags outside as well as on the inner bombsites. Astralis go up 2-0 while G2 continue their battles at 1-1.
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