device shines in Astralis victory
The Danish roster is back to winning ways after a 2-0 victory against Team Liquid.
For the second day in a row, Astralis was faced with North American resistance on the server. Yesterday the Danes lost to Evil Geniuses, which put Astralis under heavy pressure to get on the scoreboard in the "Group of Death" at ESL Pro League. Team Liquid came to the match with a flawless 2-0 win against Fnatic in their opening game.
Team Liquid picked Overpass as their map pick. A map that they had success with yesterday, but also a place, where they have had big troubles with the defense of Astralis in their last rendezvous. In last years IEM Global Challenge Grand Final, dupreeh and device shut down the NA hope on Astralis' CT-side. The same thing happened today. 13-2 was the result after the slaughter, which left Team Liquid in dire straights to try and win their map pick.
But then Jacky "Stewie2K" Yip found some much-needed momentum, and after having lost the pistol round, the NA team successfully denied Astralis any map control. Stewie2K wielded the AWP in monster to shut down the B-site for the Danes, who could not break through. And so the map went to overtime. Here Astralis started by winning a crucial T-round, which allowed them to win the match if they could hold on to their CT rounds. A fantastic last round saw a defuse from device to give the Danes round 1.
On to Dust2. Here the two teams were fighting for every inch on the map. 8-7 at the break was converted to a 14-14 nail-biter in the end. The big difference was Nicolai "dev1ce" Reedtz. The Danish AWP'er looks sharp as ever. He kept Astralis in the match with a clutch at 13-14, and at 14-15, he aced Team Liquid to take the match to another OT.
In the first round of overtime, device took out four Team Liquid players just to set the tempo in the OT rounds as well. Astralis had an extra gear in the final rounds and of course it was device with two kills in the end who sealed the deal with a 19-15 win on Dust2.
Astralis - Team Liquid 2-0 (19-17, 19-15)
MVP: Nicolai "dev1ce" Reedtz - 1.70 rating / 76-39 K-D / 108.7 ADR
