VP 2-0 fnatic, on to the playoffs
Virtus.pro ran over fnatic in the deciding match of group B 2-0 (16-9 Mirage, 16-2 Cobblestone) to secure a spot in the playoffs.
The deciding match of Group B started on fnatic's map pick, Mirage, but it went the way of the Poles right from the start. After the Terrorist pistol round win, Virtus.pro was flawless in the anti-eco's, allowing them to build up a strong economy. fnatic replied with the following two rounds, with Robin "flusha" Rönnquist getting a crucial 3k on short to make it 3-2.
The rest of the first half was mostly in control of the Polish side thanks to 1v1 clutches by Wiktor "TaZ" Wojtas and Janusz "Snax" Pogorzelski that stopped the Swedish team getting any kind of momentum as Counter-Terrorists.
After the switch, fnatic lost another pistol round which made a comeback on the Terrorist side even less likely. Jesper "JW" Wecksell started to hit his stride as fnatic overwhelmed the A site a couple of times in a row and narrowed the deficit to only four rounds, but Virtus.pro got a hold of the map after that and secured a 16-9 victory.
Virtus.pro didn't break a sweat against fnatic
fnatic won their first pistol round of the series on the Terrorist side of Cobblestone, but were instantly reset in the following one as Filip "NEO" Kubski and co. timed their HE grenade stack on B platform to perfection.
Virtus.pro were on to a perfect start after that—Snax got two close range AWP kills defending mid in the first buy to put his team in a great position to win that round, while the rest of the team chimed in in the following ones, shortly making the score 8-1 for the Poles.
JW opened up the B site defense with an AWP pick on NEO and fnatic finally got the control of the B site in round 10, but the Swedes weren't able to hold off Snax in a 2v1 situation, going down 10-1.
Down 13-2 after the first half, fnatic were unable to win the CT pistol round as TaZ's team overwhelmed the B site and Jarosław "pashaBiceps" Jarząbkowski added insult to injury by knifing flusha to close out the round and set up Virtus.pro for a 16-2 victory.
Key Moment: In round 10 on Cobblestone fnatic looked good to win their first buy round after taking over B, but Snax clutched an unlikely 1v2 with the AWP and Tec-9 to force the Swedes on another eco and denying them a chance to get back into the map.
PotM: The clutches from Janusz "Snax" Pogorzelski (three 1vX situations won) and his great play on Mirage, the closer map of the two, resulted in him getting the PotM award for the series.
Virtus.pro | K - D | +/- | ADR | Rating 2.0 |
---|---|---|---|---|
44 - 23 | +21 | 113.2 | 1.65 | |
39 - 22 | +17 | 89.1 | 1.53 | |
37 - 20 | +17 | 80.3 | 1.35 | |
29 - 26 | +3 | 75.5 | 1.09 | |
29 - 26 | +3 | 71.4 | 1.08 |
fnatic | K - D | +/- | ADR | Rating 2.0 |
---|---|---|---|---|
32 - 34 | -2 | 76.0 | 1.01 | |
23 - 36 | -13 | 57.1 | 0.79 | |
22 - 36 | -14 | 71.0 | 0.74 | |
21 - 36 | -15 | 58.2 | 0.58 | |
19 - 36 | -17 | 58.6 | 0.57 |
Professeur writes for HLTV.org and can be found on Twitter.