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Na’Vi Wins IEM XVI Cologne With A Perfect Score

s1mple has done it again. The best player in the world and his team defeated G2 Esports in the... Radu M. | 18. July 2021

s1mple has done it again. The best player in the world and his team defeated G2 Esports in the Grand Final of IEM XVI Cologne. This was a brutal match for both squads and in spite of the score (3 – 0), every single map could have gone either way.

The Key to Na’Vi’s Victory

Without a doubt, s1mple was expected to carry his team to a victory and be in the double digits on every map. And that’s exactly what happened. But his world-class performance would not have been enough. The remaining Na’Vi members had to play their part as well. In particular, B1T was spectacular. The 18-year-old was even better than s1mple on the second map of the match, getting 24 kills and a rating 2.0 of 1.37.

Despite NiKo’s efforts, his team was unable to deal with Na’Vi during the second half of each map. The start was always promising, but the closer we got to the finish line, the more clear it became each time that Na’Vi’s players were better prepared to deal with the pressure.

NiKo had 31 kills on G2’s map pick (Mirage) and 23 kills on Nuke. But it wasn’t enough. On every map, all of Na’Vi’s players had an excellent performance but at least two of G2’s players had an abysmal one. On the first map, NiKo was the one to bury his team with just 11 frags. AmaNEk was even worse, getting just 9. On the second map, NiKo played fantastically but JaCkz got only 9 frags. And on the third, once again, AmaNEk and HuNter- messed up.

To be fair, many of G2’s mistakes were forced by Na’Vi, whose players won numerous duels and clutches. The French squad should have played a perfect match to have any chance against this iteration of Natus Vincere. But it just wasn’t to be.

s1mple Broke a Record

s1mple became the first player to get 4 aces at a single CS:GO tournament. One of those aces came at the perfect time, in the Grand Final. With this performance, I think he has consolidated his CS:GO Player of the Year award for 2021. Of course, we still have 160 days left of this year. But based on the partial results, it’s pretty obvious who’s going to win the award.

 

Photo credit: IEM|Adela-Sznajder