Team Liquid is back! The North Americans qualified for the Semi-Finals at IEM Katowice by beating tournament favorites from Natus Vincere. The CIS team had won their last ten matches but was not able to follow through against a strong Team Liquid side.
The victory was made possible after a good T-side on Overpass, where Team Liquid made good use of the aggressiveness from “Stewie2K”. A 10-5 lead at halftime was just exactly enough for them to secure the map with 16-14.
Dust2 was quickly surrendered after NAVI dominance on both sides leaving Inferno as the decider. It is often said in Counter-Strike that every big match needs to be decided on Inferno. And so it did. A huge brawl was waiting.
The North Americans took the initiative from the get-go. Another strong T-side gave them a solid 10-5 lead at halftime. NAVI came back, and had the opportunity to win the match at 15-14, but “s1mple” could not finish a 1vs3 clutch which meant overtime which quickly went on to double overtime. After some incredible intense rounds of Counter-Strike, it was Team Liquid who won the match in the end after a stellar A-bombsite hold by Michael “
Grim
” Wince.
NAVI will play in the Quarter-Finals on Friday, while Team Liquid can wait until Saturday, where the Semi-Finals will take place.
Natus Vincere – Team Liquid 1-2 (14-16, 16-7, 19-22)
MVP: Jonathan ‘EliGE‘ Jablonowski – 1.12 rating / 73-63 K-D / 80.6 ADR
Highlight of the match:
