BLAST Premier: Fall Finals: Vitality Enter Grand Finals

The BLAST Premier: Fall Finals bracket is quickly moving towards the Grand Finals. Within just a few days, we’ve had to wave goodbye to mousesports, OG, G2, and FURIA. Most recently, Natus Vincere suffered a striking loss in a re-match with Astralis. In the Upper Bracket, Team Vitality managed to set themselves on top of BIG, reaching the Grand Finals.

On the first map, it looked as though BIG had found the key to Vitality’s gameplan. The Germans’ executes worked out perfectly, the players won clutches and often times sent Vitality saving. Ismailcan “XANTARES” Dörtkardeş effortlessly put up a 1.61 rating. Mathieu “ZywOo” Herbaut uncharacteristically attained only a 0.90 rating. On a 16-11 scoreline, BIG dragged them onto a second map, where they had the chance to win this match early on and advance to the Grand Finals.

But suddenly, the usual Vitality was back in full force. As soon as Nabil “Nivera” Benrlitom hit the server, the players abruptly started firing from all cylinders. Nils “k1to” Gruhne only landed three kills in total. On the other side, however, Dan “apEX” Madesclaire sat on top of 17 kills and a 1.84 rating. Vitality quickly dispatched the BIG Clan on a 16-1 scoreline, sending them onto the third and last map. Unfortunately, the Germans never really managed to recover from this shocking result. On Dust2, they gave away a 2-16 map after ZywOo secured a 1.99 rating. This means that Vitality are heading to the Grand Finals, where they will wait for the winners between Astralis and BIG.

FOOL ME ONCE…

After Natus Vincere had already won a tight Best-of-Three over Astralis, this match was of utmost importance for the Danes. Back then, they had narrowly survived Inferno, because Valeriy “B1T Vahkovskiy underperformed in his debut with the NaVi roster. Following that, however, they lost two maps, allowing Natus Vincere to advance to the Upper Bracket. But ever since then, Astralis have gained form and have only won 2-0 matches in the Lower Bracket. They absolutely stomped mousesports and after an overtime map victory over G2, they also demolished them on the second map.

This team now reprised their duel with Natus Vincere. Astralis had definitely learned and grown from their first encounter at the BLAST Premier: Fall Finals. This really showed on Inferno, where NaVi could barely keep up despite B1T posting much better numbers. They got a 7-8 half on the CT side, after which the Danes put up a near-impenetrable defense. They quickly secured a 16-11 win, sending a wounded NaVi onto Train.

After Egor “flamie” Vasilyev was swapped in for B1T, nothing changed for them. For one, flamie only reeled in 10 kills, whereas Emil “Magisk” Reif went through the roof on the CT side. On a 107 ADR, he eliminated so many Russian players that NaVi barely got the chance to win any rounds. After a 5-10 half, they still had a shot at coming back. But when Astralis won the second pistol round as well, that chance was practically gone. Afterwards, the Danes confidently marched towards a 16-7 map and match victory. This has secured their survival in the tournament, but not for long.

DO BIG STAND A CHANCE AGAINST ASTRALIS?

The Germans’ defeat against Vitality reeked of capitulation. Even in the worst of conditions, they should have walked away with a couple of rounds on the last maps at the very least. But here, the fatigue that Johannes “tabseN” Wodarz had mentioned in interviews, really set in. So how much energy do they actually have left to go up against Astralis?

Lukas “gla1ve” Rossander’s core squad seems to be growing together with every new match. It appears as though they haven’t figured out how to perfectly integrate Lucas “Bubzkji” Andersen just yet, but at least he doesn’t drag them down as much as B1T does on the NaVi camp. Astralis give the impression that they’ll be able to reach the Grand Finals tomorrow. There, they will face the end boss of current Counter-Strike. The Frenchmen of Vitality seem to be unstoppable right now and their six-man tactic seems to be working out perfectly. So after a Best-of-Three versus BIG, the Danes will have to duke it out in a similarly long affair against ZywOo and his men. Will they actually be able to do this?