The first day of ESL One Cologne major tournament is in the books. Here's a look at what happened today.
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Group A:
This group went pretty much as predicted by many. The first game saw North American side, CLG , take on the Swedish giants NiP. The map played was a classic: de_dust2. After multiple errors and a failure to close out 3v5 rounds from both teams, NiP managed to win the match 16:13 with a great display from f0rest who lead the way with 29 kills.
The second match of this group saw TSM, one of the tournament favourites, take on Australian side Regenerades on de_train. The Aussies managed to take the first five rounds, only to lose the following 13. Rengades crawled their way back into the game with six back-to-back rounds of their own, but it was too little too late for them as TSM managed to close it out 16:11 with a solid performance from Xyp9x.
The final match of group A saw NiP come up against TSM with the crowd favouring the Danes. Team SoloMid stomped the Ninjas on de_cache. They started on the less favoured T-side and with excellent calling from their ingame leader, Karrigan, they went up 5-0 before NiP found an answer. The next round was won by TSM and the rest of the game was a repeat of the struggles the Swedish had in stringing two back-to-back rounds. TSM won the second pistol and ran away with the map for a 16:3 finish.
Group B:
The first match of this group saw the Ukrainian side FlipSid3 Tactics go up against EnVyUS. The game was won convincigly by Envy who took the first pistol and lost the first gun round. Then we saw a wall of blue as Envy ran riot on de_inferno, just for F3 to be able to take the last two rounds of the half and lose the next four for a combined score of 16:3 in favour of the French.
The second match was supposed to be much closer as Teaam Kinguin took on Luminosity Gaming. It looked great for the European team as they went up 4:1 just to lose the half 10:5. As de_overpass is a CT sided map there was room for comeback even more so after they also won the second pistol round. However, LG responded with six straight rounds and closed the game out 16:6.
The final match of this group saw the first overtime of this major. Both the teams won their CT halvs on de_cobblestone, but only by small margin of one round, first NV for 8:7 half-time scoreline and than LG for a 15-15 tie. The overtime saw NV put in a convincing T side performance and managed to close it out on CT for a 19:16 finish. The most notable performer in this game was LG's FalleN who almost dropped a 30 bomb before reaching the OT, finishing on 33 kills.
Group C:
This group was labeled the "group of death." The first game, however, didn't deliver the emotions we were looking for. The Polish team of eBettle, living their dreams, were crushed by the overwhealming favourites fnatic. They were only able to salvage two rounds, one on each side for a 2-16 loss on de_mirage. The only player that was able to go up against the Swedish stars was Hyper who top fragged for his team with 12 kills.
The second match lived up to the hype of the group. We saw Titan go up against Na'Vi. The Ukrainians put up a wall of blue on the CT side of de_overpass for an 11:4 half-time score. Things looked very good for them as they also won the pistol round on the T side. The second round, however saw Titan win a forcebuy and convert it into another four rounds. From that point onwards Titan mounted the comeback train and only let Natus take three more rounds. The overtime was a different story as Na'Vi take 1/3 of the rounds and managed to close it out with a solid CT side finish for 19:17 win.
The final match of this group was also the final game of the day. We saw two gigants fight it out for a play-off spot. Natus Vincere took on the noumber one rated team of fnatic on de_inferno. The map being one of the strongest for both the teams we expected a tight game but it wasn't. We saw fnatic stomp the Ukrainians who only got two rounds on their terrorist side. Fnatic followed it up by winning three more rounds on T side to close the game out with the scoreboard saying 16:2.
Group D:
This was supposed to be another tight group. The first match saw Virtus.Pro take on the second Aussie team - Immunity. The game started great for Immunity as they won pistol round on their T side de_cobblestone and converted it into a 3-0 lead. The Poles came back into the game, however, just to barely win the half 8:7. The rest of the game is just a wall or yellow, after Immunity won the second pistol VP didn't allow them to take any more and won the game 16:8.
The second game of this group featured German Mousesports and the NA team of Cloud9. The game started out fantastic for mouse as they went up 7:2 with great individual performance from Gob b. After that C9 responded with five rounds in a row just to lose the last round of the hlaf for an 8:7 scoreline. The second half saw mouse struggle with finding their footing, only taking two rounds, one of them being the pistol which they lost to a great double scout play on the A site of de_overpass. C9 won the map 16:10 with their IGL - seangares - surprisingly, topping the scoreboard by quite a margin.
The winners match of this group saw C9 abuse VP's defence at the B site, and after cleanly losing three rounds in a row, they won six back-to-back de_cobblestone rounds. After that, VP managed to stabilise their defence and crawled back into the game for an 8:7 half-time finish. The second half saw VP win another pistol which, yet again, was converted into three clean rounds for the Poles., who this time also followed it up with two more round wins. After that C9 got their first, and what turned out to be the last, CT round on the board, as VP plowed through them and ended the game 16:8 with TaZ being the MVP of the game, leading the way with a 25:11 scoreline.
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