cs_summit 7: VP, mouz, Fnatic and Heroic to Semi Finals

In their first tournament with Frederik “acoR” Gyldstrand on board, mousesports already made Semis. Virtus.pro narrowly set themselves on top of the Ninjas in Pyjamas and Heroic pulled through against OG. Fnatic struggled on the first map, but quickly overtook Cloud9 for a 2-1 finish.

Many new lineups have already proven themselves to some extent at this event. Fnatic have had a fantastic showing alongside Jack “Jackinho” Ström Mattson. In their match versus Cloud9, the Swede first emerged as a driving force for his team, even though Freddy “KRIMZ” Johansson continues to top the scoreboard. Things aren’t getting any better for Cloud9, unfortunately, as the supposed stars of the team are still not playing up to par. The absence of Erick “Xeppaa” Bach on the scoreboard has cost them the Quarter Finals against Fnatic. The Swedes now continue on and hope for a great outing versus Heroic.

HEROIC SHOULDN’T BE UNDERESTIMATED

But the Danes are slowly waking up as well. While they did admit defeat in their encounter with mousesports, they quickly secured a 2-1 victory over MIBR later on. In the Quarter Finals, they faced off with OG, who themselves had put up a solid show thus far. On Nuke, Heroic were the absolute favorites and despite a monster performance by Issa “ISSAA” Murad, they surpassed OG. His 28 kills were almost undone by the 0.70 rating of Nathan “NBK-” Schmitt, who became a liability for his team on that map. Moving over to their own map pick, Aleksi “Aleksib” Virolainen and his men weren’t set up any better. Nikolaj “niko” Kristensen was now the one to post 27 kills on the scoreboard. OG were unable to respond to this and gave away a 10-16 second map, which meant that they had to exit the tournament.

Fnatic had actually struggled more in their match against OG. While this doesn’t mean that Heroic will necessarily outperform them, Casper “cadiaN” Møller and his troops are a well-tuned team already. Taking a look at the past few months, they have shown better form and beat stronger opponents. However, KRIMZ is somewhat of a dark horse in this equation. At cs_summit 7, he has put up a performance the likes of which we haven’t seen from him in quite a while. As of now, he holds a 1.28 rating for the entire event.

VIRTUS.PRO OR MOUSESPORTS?

The VP boys have had a great tournament so far. But in comparison, their group wasn’t nearly as dangerous and in the Quarter Finals, they faced off against the Ninjas in Pyjamas for a second time. This makes it difficult to compare them with mousesports. After all, Finn “karrigan” Andersen and his team have beaten stronger teams going into the Semi Finals, all while showing few weaknesses. Their match against FURIA was impressive from start to finish and went to show that acoR has already been integrated well into this roster.

But until this point, the definitive star of the team has been karrigan. On a 1.34 rating for cs_summit so far, he has actually surpassed quite a few leading players on his team and on most opponents’ rosters as well. Only Dzhame “Jame” Ali can boast to have performed a better event so far. These two leading figures will now clash in the Semi Finals, with no clear favorite in sight.

WHO WILL REACH THE GRAND FINALS OF CS_SUMMIT 7?

Virtus.pro and mousesports clearly dominate the playing field. The two each hold a 1.18 rating and are miles ahead of Fnatic and Heroic on 1.07. The winning side of this match-up will likely win the Grand Finals as well. For VP, this would be a great start into the year, but karrigan would arguably want these last tournaments with his old team to be a success as well.

Rumors indicate that he is already on his way to FaZe Clan, which means that he is only playing out his remaining contract with mousesports. This would obviously deal a heavy blow to the German organization, now that karrigan has proven again to still be a competitive force on an individual level.