G2 get revenge over NiP and knock them down to lower bracket at BLAST
The French-Balkan mixture got revenge over NiP after having been previously knocked out from the IEM Winter by REZ and company.
G2 have bested NiP in their opening match at the BLAST World Final after securing a 2-1 victory.
NiKo and company are now through to the upper semi-finals of the event, while es3tag and the rest of NiP will have to fight their way out of the lower bracket. G2 will face either Vitality or Astralis in the semi-finals, meanwhile, the Ninjas will be taking upon the loser of the match.
The Ninjas got off to a good start to the series on Nuke, dominating G2 on the offensive side and pulling them all across the map to end the first half with a massive 10-5 advantage. It looked done and dusted when REZ and company secured the pistol in the second half and converted the following two rounds to go up 13-5, however, G2 weren’t ready to give up the map yet as they closed the gap to four rounds, looking motivated to make the comeback happen. But despite all the effort late in the second half, it was already too late to attempt a comeback as the Swedes just needed one round to close the map, which they eventually did at 16-11 after finding the recipe for success.
Dust2 began with a much closer fight between the two teams who traded rounds back-and-forth until NiP went to halftime with a single-round advantage. Things turned out different in the second half though as G2 built up momentum on the CT-side after winning the pistol and breaking NiP’s economy as soon as they got rifles in their hands. G2 had everything under control for the rest of the half and only allowed NiP to add three rounds to the scoreboard before they closed it out with a similar scoreline as the first map to force the decider.
The third map of Inferno was a close affair and a real nail-biter, which took all 30 rounds to find a winner. An excellent performance from G2’s Bosnian star, NiKo, helped G2 close out the action, in the end, to take the series 2-1 and get revenge over NiP after they previously knocked them out from the IEM Winter event in the semi-final. The Bosnian star player dropped 34 frags and finished on top of the scoreboard with a 1.61 Rating and 101.7 ADR
Nuke: 11-16 NiKo ~ 1.36 Rating ~ 23-18 K/D ~ 106.4 ADR
Dust2: 16-11 NiKo ~ 1.39 Rating ~ 25-20 K/D ~ 103.8 ADR
Inferno: 16-14 NiKo ~ 1.61 Rating ~ 34-17 K/D ~ 101.7 ADR
MVP:
Nikola “NiKo” Kovac ~ 1.46 Rating ~ 82-55 K/D ~ 103.9 ADR ~ 70.2% KAST
G2's next match will be on Thursday at 19:30 (CET) against the winner of Vitality vs. Astralis, whilst NiP will face the loser on Thursday at 13:30 (CET)
