ESL One Cologne EU: NiP & Heroic Book Playoffs Spots

The Ninjas in Pyjamas made a strong showing against Natus Vincere today and Heroic were in great shape against fnatic. Both teams have now booked their playoffs spots and have to go up against Astralis, Sprout, Complexity, and G2.

NIP 2-0 NAVI

On the first map, NaVi’s outlook on the first half was already very grim. The Ninjas were able to amass 11 points on the T side and despite the usual performance by Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev, NaVi were unable to get into the game at all. However, this changed in the second half. On the back of a pistol round victory, the Russians successfully strung 5 round wins together. This was all they could get, however, as Fredrik “REZ” Sterner and Hampus “hampus” Poser made sure to secure the remaining rounds.

The Ninjas in Pyjamas were thus only one map away from playoffs. On Train, the Swedish boys deservedly got their match victory. All players were able to post positive results, but hampus played on an entirely different level. The Swede landed a total of 21 kills with just 6 deaths. His 1.86 rating came as no surprise. Even s1mple was unable to keep up, only getting a meager 10 kills. The map eventually went to Heroic in a decisive 16-3 fashion. Natus Vincere, on the other hand, will have to wait for another event to redeem themselves, as their ESL One Cologne trip is now over.

HEROIC 2-0 FNATIC

The Swedes longed for some success in the online era. Unfortunately, they will now have to wait a little longer, as Heroic have quite high expectations for this event themselves. After an incredibly close loss to G2 Esports, the Danes wanted to reach playoffs via the Lower Bracket – and fnatic stood in their way.

But not for long, as Casper “cadiaN” Møller and his colleagues started to grind the fnatic players down right away. On the T side of Vertigo, they got up to 9 points at halftime, with which they could force the map victory relatively quickly. Despite fnatic reversing Vertigo’s halftime score on Overpass, they were legitimately overrun by the T side of Heroic. With two 16-11 map victories, the Danes successfully got a hold of their playoffs ticket. In both cases, René “TeSeS” Madsen was the top performer and was able to amass 27 kills on Overpass alone. Fnatic now share the same fate as Natus Vincere. Their aspirations for this event have gone up in flames and only few opportunities remain this year to reclaim the top spots of European Counter-Strike.

The Group Stage of ESL One Cologne is nearing its end. Tomorrow, we will witness the last two Decider Matches between MAD Lions and OG, as well as FaZe and Vitality. The playoffs bracket is slowly being filled to the brink with competitive top teams.