IEM Beijing EU: Group A Conclusion

The last match from Group A has been played out and the first half of the playoffs team list is set. After a tense battle, the teams from Group B will soon join them.

FAZE & COMPLEXITY REACH PLAYOFFS EARLY ON

Olof “olofmeister” Kajbjer is still helping out after FaZe have lost their best player to G2 Esports. But this doesn’t really seem to impact them a lot, as they have booked their ticket to the playoffs with two straight match wins.

OG were their biggest challenge and similarly to IEM New York, this match forced them to bring their A Game. At one point, FaZe conceded a 20-22 overtime, but won two rather one-sided maps to make up for it, securing a 2-1 finish. Helvijs “broky” Saukants gave his best NiKo impression and secured 80 kills, making him the heavy lifter for his team. Even though olofmeister only got a 0.83 rating, this isn’t necessarily a bad sign. After all, the Swede has been out of the loop for over half a year now, and likely needs some time to get back into the game.

Vitality managed to make it a tense affair again. A 16-13 Overpass win gave FaZe the map advantage, but on Mirage, they had to enter overtime. There, Håvard “rain” Nygaard and his men finally put and end to the match. Once again, broky got the highest kill count and delivered an MVP worthy performance.

Complexity, who had just recently signed Justin “jks” Savage, got through to the playoffs as well. A 2-0 over fnatic sent them into a duel with Natus Vincere. Even though Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev and company secured a map win on Nuke, two map victories followed for Complexity. Slowly but surely, jks is growing into his role. With a 1.15 rating, he wasn’t really dominant, but continues to prove that he is more than capable of doing his part for the team.

NATUS VINCERE AND VITALITY FIND SUCCESS IN THE LOWER BRACKET

Because of their Opening Match victory, Natus Vincere only had to play out one match in the Lower Bracket in order to qualify for playoffs. Na’Vi got a domestic match-up versus Team Spirit, which they managed to win despite a strong performance by Viktor “sdy” Orudzhev. As (almost) always, s1mple played out a fantastic series, but Denis “electronic” Sharipov stole the show on a 1.42 rating for the two maps.

MAD Lions had previously delivered a 2-1 upset over fnatic, but apparently they had lost all energy going up against Vitality. This time around, Nabil “Nivera” Benrlitom and Richard “shox” Papillon split duties. On Nuke, shox effortlessly got up to a 2.04 rating, cracking the 30 bomb along the way. The Lions were complexity overwhelmed, which resulted in a meager performance out of all players. Nuke quickly went on Vitality’s scoreboard.

On Inferno, Ismail “refrezh” Ali finally woke up, but even he couldn’t compete with Nivera. The Belgian secured a 1.47 rating and was helped by Kévin “misutaaa” Rabier, who also put up a fantastic display. The Danes only managed to acquire 8 rounds in total, after which Mathieu “ZywOo” Herbaut and his men sealed the deal.

WHO WILL FOLLOW THESE TEAMS INTO THE PLAYOFFS?

The recent performances out of the Heroic camp seem to indicate that they can dispatch the Ninjas in Pyjamas with relative ease. So they will probably secure a playoffs spot, which would put them up against Natus Vincere or Vitality next. ENCE will compete with their newest addition, Joonas “doto” Forss. They will likely not be ready for Astralis just yet, which would arguably grant a rather easy victory to the Danes. The mouz roster has had shaky moments in the past, whereas BIG have put up a relatively consistent show in recent time. Still, Astralis should lock their playoffs spot in on their first try.

In the Lower Bracket, the rest of the teams will get a second chance. From all the lineups, G2 Esports and the Ninjas in Pyjamas look most promising. In just a few hours, we will see Astralis and ENCE clash, which will reveal more Lower Bracket pairings soon.