The second day of Dreamhack Summer is behind us with Group D shaping up as arguably the most interesting one so far, featuring a slew of nail-biting matches. Lemondogs topped it, with Na`Vi placing second. The playoffs have also been drawn, and CS fans will be looking forward Virtus.pro versus Natus Vincere as the highlight of the bracket.
A surprise at the start of Group D; the Swedes, Flipside Tactics, who were widely considered as the underdogs of this match and were a team coming from the qualifiers, sent one of the top favorites, Natus Vincere, to the Loser's match after a tense but very entertaining match. Choice fell to de_dust2 where Na`Vi took the Terrorist side first and opened the match with a 3-0 lead. Flipside managed to take the fourth round and prevent the growing streak, but Na`Vi stayed confident and got to a lead of 7-3. After the 11th round of the first half Flipside just seemingly woke up and won four consecutive rounds to make it a draw at 7-7, but Na`Vi still ended the first half in front with 8-7. The second half started in a shocking way as Flipside managed to win six rounds in a row making it 13-8 in their favor. Na`Vi couldn't do much at that point and the Swedes had a match point at 15-9, but Na`Vi managed to deal with the bomb situation at B site by defusing it in the last second. At this point the hype was incredibly high. Flipside lost 5 rounds in a row where they had to go for an eco round twice. At the point when the score was 15-13, Flipside were in a situation where it was 2-on-2 and they had planted bomb. In the end it was all left up to Edward who tried to save Na`Vi by himself against the two FS' players, but he just couldn't pull it off and Flipside came up on top.
In the second match-up of round one, Expert Gaming and Lemondogs followed the example of their friends from the group as their games didn't lack any action. The match was played on de_mirage where Lemondogs chose to start on the CT side. This brought them an 11-4 lead at the first half and it seemed like they were gonna finish the game easily. However, Expert Gaming, the second team to come from the qualifiers, held their ground and took it to 15-14 and a match point, at which point Lemondogs managed to force the match into overtime. In overtime Lemondogs won 2-1 on both sides, making the final score of the match 19-17 in their favor.
Whatever was pushing Flipside forward in their match against Na'Vi seemed to be absent in this game versus Lemondogs. The winner's match was totaly one sided, where Flipside wasn't present. Lemondogs opened the match on de_dust2 on the CT side with an eight round streak, when Flipside managed to win their only round of the game. The final result was 16-1 for Lemondogs who are now the first placed team in the group. In the Loser's match it was looking like Na'Vi was going to exact swift revenge over Expert Gaming for their loss in round one. It's worth mentioning that Expert Gaming won the pistol round on de_mirage on Terrorist side, which was then followed by 3 rounds won in a row for Na`Vi. The score at the end of the first half was 12-3 and no one was giving the Norwegian team much chance, but just like their first match of the group against Lemondogs, they managed to start a comeback, although in the end it wasn't enough for the overtime. Na`Vi qualified themselves for the consodilation match of the group with a score of 16-11.
Na'Vi had a chance to get revenge on Flipside, and they took it. And if the first match of these two teams in the group was a real thriller, the second one was totaly opposite. Na'Vi had a control throughout the whole match, projecting confidence all throughout the game and even score a knife kill by Starix in the fourth round. In the end Flipside managed to take five rounds only, and Na`Vi advanced to the playoffs.
Playoffs Schedule
June 16th
10.00 CEST - Lemondogs vs Epsilon - BO3
10.00 CEST - Virtus.pro vs Natus Vincere - BO3
10.00 CEST - NInjas in Pyjamas vs Titan - BO3
10.00 CEST - HellRaisers vs SK Gaming - BO3
14.30 CEST- Semi Final 1 - BO3
18.00 CEST- Semi Final 2 - BO3
22.00 CEST- Final Match - BO3
Head over to our coverage hub for more information.
