IEM Cologne: NaVi and G2 in the Grand Finals!

The recent playoffs days carried quite a few exciting matches. In the form of Natus Vincere, at least one event favorite managed to make the Grand Finals. Now, the s1mple versus NiKo show is on and the winning team will take home the first LAN trophy since spring 2020!

The circle is complete again. At IEM Katowice 2020, the last offline event since the beginning of the pandemic, G2 Esports and Natus Vincere already stood in the Grand Finals. Back then, NaVi were the ones to take the trophy home and secure a quick 3-0 victory. But a lot has changed since then. A former FaZe star has left for G2. Egor “flamie” Vasilyev is out of the NaVi starting five. Both teams had to fight through a brutal online era, but it seems as though their hard work has finally paid off.

ASTRALIS CAN CHOKE?

Going up against G2, the Danes looked incredibly strong. Granted, the first map was a fluke, but they pulled themselves together for Dust2 and won convincingly. On Inferno, they initiated a comeback that made them look like gods. But then they collapsed in the most crucial of all rounds. Three players were in a retake scenario against Nemanja “huNter-” Kovač and Nikola “NiKo” Kovač, both of which had less than 50 HP combined. But Astralis hesitated. They let so much time pass that they could only jump onto the spot and attempt the defuse. Two quick sprays later, the Danes were down and G2 held the lead again.

Astralis never managed to recover. In that very moment, they could have avoided their eventual 14-16 fate. Now, they will have to watch the Grand Finals from their hotel rooms. G2, however, have proven real resilience – something they will desperately need in their fight against Natus Vincere.

FAZE AREN’T THERE YET

For Finn “karrigan” Andersen and his troops, IEM Cologne almost turned out to be a miracle run. Barely anyone would have expected them to make it to the playoffs. But then they also defeated the reigning #1 team! After that, almost everything seemed possible and their fans hoped for a great fight versus NaVi.

But the Semi Finals have proven that FaZe have a long road ahead of themselves. They seemed uncoordinated on both T and CT side, the executes weren’t right, and Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev found it the easiest task ever to mow them down. Seeing them break apart just a day after their sensational victory over Gambit, it’s plain as day that the team needs more time to grow together.

S1MPLE VS. NIKO

This fight has already been decided. With a 1.56 rating after just 11 maps played, s1mple is the uncontested best player of IEM Cologne. Denis “electronic” Sharipov and Valeriy “B1T” Vakhovskiy are on 1.28 and 1.20 ratings, respectively. For B1T, this is a particularly huge achievement. IEM Cologne is his first big LAN tournament and after he had struggled for the better part of his online tenure with NaVi, he has now proven himself worthy throughout. On a 1.18 rating, NiKo isn’t even in the Top 5.

That’s even though NiKo is the record holder at LANs! At ESL One New York 2017, he attained a 1.70 event rating and has been unmatched so far. It’s categorically impossible for s1mple to catch up to that in Cologne. Nonetheless, the MVP race has already been decided here. The Ukrainian would have to exit the Grand Finals with zero kills in order to lose now.

These two are nonetheless the lone frontrunners for their teams. So in the broadest sense, the fight will take place between them. If one manages to nullify the impact of the other, the game could already be decided. The same teams from the last LAN event prior to the pandemic are now in the Grand Finals of IEM Cologne. A lot has happened since then, but the storyline remains the same: Can G2 finally mount the ultimate upset, or will s1mple power his team through to yet another trophy?