MLG: Columbus – Day 5 recap

We were about to find out today in the Nationwide Arena who would be final two at the first Counter-Strike: Global Offensive Major in 2016.

Luminosity vs. Virtus.Pro 2:1 (17:19, 16:10, 16:11)

Maps: de_cache, de_cbble and de_overpass, Best-of-Three

Kicking things off was the last quarter-final between Luminosity and Virtus.Pro on de_cache with the Brazilian team starting as defenders. With Wiktor "TaZ" Wojtas and Janusz "Snax" Pogorzelski securing the round in a 2vs.5 clutch we saw the Polish team 04:00 in the lead after the first buy round. Luminosity started to win rounds but at too high a cost, which later would pay off for Virtus.Pro as they closed out the first half with a 10:05 lead. The Brazilians then planted the bomb in the opening round of the second half and denied the retake as Fernando "fer" Alvarenga managed to get a triple kill. Losing the first buy round won't stop the team either, quickly securing the three following rounds for the 11:11 tie. VP wasn't able to stop Luminosity's momentum but somehow managed to survive and fight their way back with the first map on the line, tying things up at 15:15 for the first overtime of the day. LG was first to secure a round, followed by a round for VP as they pushed towards mid and after coming out on top of a 2vs.2 situation the Polish team had the chance to seal the deal. Ultimately, they did so with a 19:17 score line.

Heading onto de_cbble we saw LG once again taking the lead with 04:00, VP finally managed to secure a round for they scoreboard but only to get reset immediately after. The Poles called for a timeout but lost the round. However, thanks to Paweł "byali" Bieliński's quad-kill VP could secure some rounds for the 11:04 score line after the first half of the second map in favour of Luminosity. Despite losing the pistol round at the beginning of the second half, Virtus.Pro managed to ignite the fire for a comeback. LG immediately called a timeout which payed out eventually as they won the round after their tactical timeout. By securing three rounds, LG was at match point, closing out the second map with a 16:10 score line in the end.

The deciding map should be de_overpass where we could see Virtus.Pro having seemingly a better start then the two maps before, thanks to Jarosław "pashaBiceps" Jarząbkowski's triple in the pistol round. Going for the force buy things went terribly wrong for the Poles as the Brazilian team took the 03:01 lead. It looked like it could be a back and forth game but after deciding to do the force buy on their own, VP failed to succeed, standing 03:12 on the back foot at halftime break. LG won the pistol round but the Polish squad answered directly in the second round of the first half. The Brazilians then picked up another weapon round to bring the score line to 14:06 and the Poles answered right back again thanks to Jarząbkowski finding the entry frags twice. As Filip "neo" Kubski was raining havoc with his AWP, Virtus.Pro could secure 11 rounds for their scoreboard but Tacio "TACO" Filho's triple-kill gave the Brazilian squad four match points. Luminosity closed out the series with 16:11 – winning 2:1, sending Virtus.Pro down to 5th - 8th place in the first Major of the year.

Natus Vincere vs. Astralis 2:0 (16:14, 16:05)

Maps: de_inferno and de_dust2, Best-of-Three

To find out who will be our first grand final candidate we headed onto de_inferno first. Natus Vincere first took five rounds in a row before Astralis started a comeback to tie things 05:05. The Danish line-up managed to push it even further in their favour before Na'Vi took the last round thanks to a strong B side defence. The second half started similar as the CIS team managed to secure five out of six rounds again. Astralis however had not given up quite yet and fought their way back and after getting three rounds in a row it seemed like they would be able to take match point first but a single rifle only worked out somehow for Natus Vincere who pushed on to take the first map 16:14 off of Astralis' hands.

Kicking off things with a triple by seized on de_dust2, Na'Vi rushed for a 06:00 lead in the first half of the second map. Two rounds later the Danes finally went on to secure three rounds on their own, sadly René "cajunb" Borg threw away the fourth round, which send Natus Vincere back on track. This time however, despite close situations, Astralis found no way back in, losing the first half 03:12. Losing the pistol round only made things worse for the Danes. Although winning some, directly losing after a secured round to a force by of Na'Vi almost sealed the deal as the CIS-squad went on to take map two 16:05, advancing to the grand final which will be played later today.

Team Liquid vs. Luminosity 0:2 (15:19, 16:19)

Maps: de_mirage and de_cache, Best-of-Three

To determine our second grand finalist we head onto de_mirage where the North American Team Liquid had to face off against the South American Luminosity. Following insane individual actions the game began with a back and forth between both teams. Spencer "Hiko" Martin then managed a quad-kill in the first eco round, potential for a hard reset was given next round but thanks to Lincoln "fnx" Lau double Desert Eagle kills LG could prevail. Keeping up the pressure, five out of six rounds went directly onto the South American scoreboard before the North American team finally stroked back, cutting the gap down to 05:07 by winning three rounds in a row. It looked like Marcelo "coldzera" David would stop Liquid's run, in the end the final two rounds also went in favour of Team Liquid. Reaching match point by winning the first five rounds of the second half, most people would have assumed now that we would see a third map but David however seem to had other plans, stopping an apartment push with four insane AWP kills, including a jumping double kill. LG picked up round after round. Liquid looked desperately for the last round but even a tactical timeout called at 15:13 still in Team Liquid's favour could not prevent the madness: The South American rival took it into overtime where they secured four rounds to take the lead in the series with a crushing 19:15 blow.

Team Liquid then started strong again on de_cache, winning four rounds in a row before it seemed that LG could secure a round. Martin however denied this with a huge 1 vs. 4 clutch with planted bomb. It looked more and more as if the game was gliding out of Luminosity's hands. Gabriel "FalleN" Toledo clutched a 1 vs. 2 on his own, igniting the fire for a comeback as they took it to a 06:06 tie. Martin continued to rain havoc on their rival, finishing the first half with 24 frags, only getting caught five times. Carrying on that momentum, Team Liquid was once again in the lead, this time with a score line of 15:06. Many believed that the North American team will close out the map and head into a third one but it would only became a repeat of the first map as Liquid was unable to finish it out. The team went on a spiral into the state of disarray and questionable decisions started to build up over the course of a number of rounds, enabling Luminosity to force another overtime. Taking the first two rounds as defender, Liquid finally stopped the eleven round winning streak from the Brazilians by taking the third round in the first half of the overtime. However, it did little to the unstoppable force of Luminosity who started to claim back-to-back rounds as attacker to seal the deal with a dramatic 2:0 (19:15, 19:16) victory to proceed to the grand final of the Major.