ENCE defeat Astralis in three-map-thriller to win Spring Showdown

BLAST Premier Spring Showdown 2022 had reached its final Bo3-series as Astralis and ENCE geared up and got ready for a thrilling brawl in the Grand Final of the event. A spot at the upcoming BLAST Premier Spring Final 2022 event was at stake and with both teams in-form it was difficult to predict the outcome before the brawl got underway. And close was between the two rosters. After a crushing defeat on Mirage, ENCE pulled through on both Ancient and Nuke and managed to take down the Danes of Astralis in what became a close three-map-thriller. The 2-1 victory against Astralis means that "Snappi" and his troops have secured themselves a spot at the upcoming BLAST Premier Spring Final 2022 event.

The first map of the Bo3-series was picked by ENCE and saw the brawl kick off on Mirage. The sandy map of Mirage is the most played map out of all maps in CS:GO's history, between the top 30 teams, and to say that both teams are familiar with Mirage would be an understatement. Despite being the map pick of ENCE, it was Astralis to start the strongest on Mirage. A strong and cohesive defense from the CT-sided Astralis, with "blameF" wreaking havoc in middle, proved too difficult for ENCE to break through and Astralis were able to go to halftime at the impressive scoreline of 12-3. After switching sides, ENCE would have to do something absolutely spectacular in order to get back into Mirage. The spectacular never happened and instead, it was Astralis to finish what they had started on their CT-side with absolute domination. Without letting ENCE win a single round in the second half of Mirage, the Danes claimed the first map of the brawl at the scoreline of 16-3.

The second map of the series was picked by Astralis and to nobody's surprise, it meant a trip to the jungle. With a phenomenal win rate of 79% in the past three months (14 maps), the Danes have become more than accustomed to Ancient as one of their strongest picks in the official map pool, if not the strongest. Whilst it has, at times, seemed almost impossible to take down Astralis and "k0nfig" on Ancient, it was ENCE to hit the ground running on their CT-side and secure an early lead against the Danes. It took until the scoreboard said 7-0 in favor of ENCE for the Astralis boys to wake up and secure their first round on Ancient. Slowly but surely, the Danes managed to pick up a handful of rounds and a somewhat respectable T-sided half at the scoreline of 10-5. The second half saw Astralis try to catch back up with ENCE on the arguably favorable CT side. Ultimately, ENCE had secured too big of a lead for Astralis to catch back up and Ancient ended in favor of ENCE at 16-13.

The third and final map of the series came to be Nuke, a map that both teams are incredibly strong on. From early on it was clear that Nuke could be anyone's map to take home as both teams seemed poised to take home the series. Starting on the CT-side, however, it was ENCE to take control of Nuke initially. Despite yet another phenomenal performance from "blameF", the Danes had to see themselves behind at halftime at the scoreline of 10-5 yet again. Just as on Ancient, Astralis fought to close the gap between themselves and ENCE, and things got very close in the end. Ultimately, however, it was once again too late for Astralis to get into the game and "Snappi" and his troops could close out the three-map-thriller and take home the series at the scoreline of 16-12.

ENCE - Astralis 2-1 | BLAST Premier Spring Showdown Europe (Grand Final)

3-16 (Mirage) | blameF - 2.53 Rating / 31-5 K-D / 150.6 ADR 

16-13 (Ancient) | dycha - 1.25 Rating / 26-21 K-D / 94.5 ADR 

16-12 (Nuke) | hades - 1.49 Rating / 27-17 K-D / 90.5 ADR 

MVP: Benjamin "blameF" Bremer - 1.40 Rating / 70-43 K-D / 97.1 ADR