Astralis bested Na'Vi in the quarter-finals of Intel Extreme Masters XI: Katowice 2017 and advanced to the semi-finals where they will be facing Heroic.
de_Mirage - 16:11 (8:7, 8:4)
The second quarter-final matchup began with Na'Vi's map pick - de_Mirage. Neither team was able to gain control of the map early on as the rounds were traded back and forth. Later in the first half, the Danes of Astralis gained the first solid advantage by making it 7-4 on the CT side. The 12th round saw Ladislav "GuardiaN" Kovács and Ioann "Edward" Sukhariev turning a 2v5 situation into a 2 on 2. The Slovakian AWPer then clutched the round by grabbing his third kill on a 1v1 to start Na'Vi's three-round run to even the things at 7-7. In the final round of the first half, Markus "Kjaerbye" Kjærbye picked up two opening kills and using their advantage in numbers Astralis won the round to determine the first half score as 8-7.
Switching to the T side, Astralis began the half by grabbing the second pistol round. Despite having a far better economy in the following two rounds, winning these rounds came with a huge cost, as they lost the majority of their team on both occasions. The first gunround went Na'Vi's way thanks to their brilliant bombsite A defence, but Astralis immediately responded with a round victory despite lacking utility, and with all but a single smoke they were able to reset the CT economy. Struggling with money, the CIS squad lost three more rounds. At that point the score was 15-8 in favour of Astralis and things weren't looking good for GuardiaN and co. Playing against opponents that were on map point, Ladislav "GuardiaN" Kovács picked up three kills with his AWP but found himself in a 1v2 after-plant situation nonetheless. Despite having nothing but a glasscannon AWP, he clutched the round and made the score 15-9.
Oleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev joined up with GuardiaN as Na'Vi used a double-AWP setup and Na'Vi won two more rounds in an attempt at a comeback, primarily as a result of the successful double-AWP. In the 27th round, when the score was 15-11, Astralis executed an A hit flawlessly and planted the bomb. Nicolai "device" Reedtz picked up a CT AWP, killed three with it and won the round for his team. With a 16-11 score line, Astralis defeated Na'Vi in their opponent's map pick and moved on to their soil, Nuke.
de_Nuke - 16:2 (14:1, 2:1)
The victors of Mirage started their map pick as the T side, kicking off with Lukas "gla1ve" Rossander's 1v1 clutch in the first pistol round. Using the economic advantage, Astralis dominated the game with great entry frags and map control. Na'Vi finally took a timeout after the fifth round, having conceded all of them. The timeout didn't work for the CIS-based team, as every single Astralis player survived in the next round, against Na'Vi's half-buy with UMPs. Three more rounds were played and won by Astralis and their lead was getting exponentially getting larger as the score stood at 9-0.
In the 10th round, GuardiaN's triple-kill with his famous AWP won Na'Vi their first round, however, a quick A hit from Astralis reset the CT economy and made the score 10-1. After their economy broke, Na'Vi seemed to lose both their confidence and hope, as Denis "seized" Kostin's team continuously force-bought until the end of the first half. To make things worse, Na'Vi lost all the remaining rounds and the score was 14-1 in favour of Astralis.
Starting the second half as the T side, Na'Vi won the second pistol round thanks to Edward's triple-kill. Unfortunately for the Eastern Europeans, Astralis' pistol-armour force buy was more than enough to reset the Na'Vi economy at 15-2. Against the map and match point, all Na'Vi had was an AK-47 and four pistols. Despite s1mple's desperate efforts, Astralis won yet another round and advanced to the semi-finals with a series score of 2-0. The Danes will face Heroic in the semi-final of Intel Extreme Masters XI: Katowice 2017 tomorrow.
Image courtesy of Intel Extreme Masters
