Sunday night paiN and ATK fought each other in the Grand Final at ESL Challenger League, where the winner would take home $20,000 and a spot at the ESL Pro League Season 17 Conference. 

During the encounter ATK's Ian 'motm' Hardy was struck by a Molotov Cocktail, and with only 3 HP the dink of the bottle was enough to take him down. 

Have you ever seen that in a competitive CS:GO match?

paiN

Astralis came extremely close to being knocked out of ESL Pro League as the first team in Group D. The Danes had to go through overtime on Inferno to secure the win against ATK.

The match started with Danish dominance on Overpass, but quickly the match turned sour for Astralis. On Mirage the T-side of the Danes failed to impress and gave ATK easy conditions to take down the map 16-8. On Inferno, it was again the T-side for Astralis that caused them problems. Only four rounds on the T-side left the Danes with a mountain to climb. 

In a hectic ending to the match, Astralis managed to equalize the score at 15-15 after winning a 3vs5 situation in the last round. In overtime, the Danes smashed ATK, who had lost all momentum.

Astralis will continue their journey in the Last Chance Stage tomorrow against either Team Spirit or NAVI.

MVP: {cflag:DK} Nicolai 'device' Reedtz - 1.57 rating / 41-17 K-D / 94.1 ADR

device

Astralis

Day 2 of the ESL Pro League S17 Group D is done and dusted. During the afternoon matches, something special happened on the stream. While the Astralis and Natus Vincere match was on a break after the first map, s1mple found himself as the new ATK coach. The world´s best thought he was going to play Astralis on the second map. However, it looked like a career shift as s1mple couldn't find his team after their break.  

Watch s1mple become the new coach of ATK:

s1mple

Liquid secured themselves their first victory at the ESL Pro League Season 17. The North American roster took an important win over their rivals from ATK. The first map of the series was a close encounter between the two North American teams as Liquid managed to take nine rounds on the CT side of Mirage. Switching sides, Liquid was quick to gain a 12-6 lead after winning the second pistol round of the map. Despite ATK winning six out of seven rounds in a row to make things a bit more close, Liquid won three straight rounds to close out map one 16-12. With oSee playing well, ATK found it hard to play around mid as the Liquid AWPer was hitting all his shots. oSee dropped a 1.56 rating on Mirage. 

Overpass was up next. Winning the first three rounds of the map was ATK as they managed to secure the first pistol round and covert the following. Despite the lead ATK had gained, Liquid was simply too strong on their own map pick. A great start for ATK turned into a good T side for Liquid who won nine out of 12 rounds to win the half 9-6. On the CT side, Liquid dominated their American rivals. With all five players of Liquid playing well, the scoreline of the second half was 7-1 in favor of Liquid. EliGE and co. won the map 16-7 and the series to secure their first win at the event. 

MVP: Josh 'oSee' Ohm - 1.46 rating / 45-26 K-D / 86.2 ADR

Team Liquid

ENCE secured themselves their first victory at the ESL Pro League Season 17. The mixed European roster took an important win over ATK on Anubis. The first map of the series ended in total domination as ENCE managed to take 10 rounds on the T side of Anubis. Switching sides, ENCE was fast to close out the game winning six out of seven on the CT side to win ATK´s map pick 16-6. 

Ancient was up next. A close encounter between the two teams was on the schedule as the first half ended with an 8-7 scoreline in favor of ATK, but this time on the favored CT side. However, switching to the T side, ATK quickly found the momentum they needed to go up 15-10. ENCE fought their way back to 15-14 but with ice in their veins, ATK closed out the map 16-14. 

Ancient came out as the last map of the series. What looked like a close encounter between the two teams ended up in a controlled victory for ENCE. The Brazillian team got nine rounds on the weaker T side. A nice T side was enough for ENCE to close out the series on the favored CT side. With Maden playing well, ATK stood no chance against the better team from ENCE who won Ancient 16-9. 

MVP: Guy "NertZ" Iluz - 1.31 rating / 64-47 K-D / 86.0 ADR

ENCE

ATK took on MIBR during the ESL Pro League Season 17 conference. A match that decided who will qualify for the ESL Pro League Season 17. 

MIBR Started out well as they won their own map pick 16-8 on Ancient. A great T side from the Brazilian team was enough for them to close out the game on the favored CT Side. The second map was ATK´s map pick Anubis. In a close second map with rounds back and forth, ATK was the team to take the win in the end and secure themselves a third map. 

Inferno left as the decider and ATK came out pressing the speeder from the very start, North American team came in front 13-2 on the weaker T side. With 13 rounds in the bag, ATK took the last three rounds to take a 16-6 victory over MIBR to secure a spot at ESL Pro League Season 17. 

ATK will take on the world's best at ESL Pro League Season 17 which kicks off in late February. 

The North American team ATK looks as follows:

{cflag:SE} Jonathan 'b0denmaster' Bodenmalm

ATK has announced on their Twitter that Jonathan "djay" Dallal is their newest addition and the rifler will be joining the active lineup.

Coming from EG White who just days before released their roster. The 29-year-old has shown some impressive results in recent tournaments playing under the EG White and Party Animals banner.

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In the past three months, the rifle has produced some great stats averaging 1.13 rating / 0.73 KPR / 75% KAST / 1.07 Impact / 78.3 ADR.

djay

Team Mythic took on ATK doing the ESL Challenger League Season 43 North America. 

On the second map of the game, ATK dominated Mytich on the T side. Up 10-3, cooper tried to save an AWP, but instead of bringing the AWP with him into the next round, he rifler ended up being trolled and knife by BODENMASTER. 

ATK won the game 2-0 as they controlled the game from the very start. 

Cooper-

Mythic

ATK took on team Mythic in the ESL Challenger League Season 43 North America. Going into the match, ATK was the clear favorite. Team Mythic is currently placed 113 on the HLTV world ranking list whereas ATK is placed 40. ATK dominated the match from the start winning Mythic´s own map pick 4-16 and Mirage 5-16. 

On Mirage, we saw a peak of what the NA scene can offer as tweiss took down five players of ATK in a 1v5 clutch. Being alone vs five, tweiss played the clutch to perfection. Tweiss takes the duels 1v1 so the duels always are in his favor. 

Despite winning the clutch 1v5, tweiss and co. saw themself lose the next two rounds and lose the map.

Check out the impressive 1v5 clutch right here:

[twitchClip:BusyPolishedToothChocolateRain-lRRlf8Obic6k2-X4]

tweiss

Counter-Strike’s last update brought back Anubis as an official Active Duty map replacing Dust2. Anubis was first introduced in CS:GO back in March 2020 in scrimmage mode before the developers from Valve made it an official competitive map just ten days after its first appearance.

Located in the desert land of Egypt, Anubis almost makes players feel like they’re in a museum with all the Pharaoh statues, hieroglyphs, and history signs on walls.

Many CS:GO fans would have expected that it would take a while for teams to actually play the map in an official, but just around 11 days after the release of the update, we have now seen the first official match getting played on Anubis.

At the ESEA Autumn 2022 Cash Cup 4 NA, ATK picked Anubis as their map pick against MIBR in the semi-finals of the event. After an exciting fight, we saw ATK come out on top with a 16-12 victory over the Brazilians.

Here’s what we learned from the first pro game on Anubis:

MIBR

After a disaster Friday night the fans of Brazilian Counter-Strike got something to cheer about today.

paiN Gaming got a step closer to Rio with a 2-0 victory against ATK.

A 16-9, 16-6 win underlined the dominance that paiN had in the matchup in the "2-2" bracket.

The highest-rated player from paiN was Romeu 'zevy' Rocco, who scored a 1.50 rating on the two maps.

paiN will be back in action tomorrow, where they will be fighting for the last remaining ticket at the Americas RMR against two other teams.

The best of five Grand Final ended with a quick 3-0 victory for paiN.

The Brazilians came into the match with a 1-0 map advantage after having won the upper bracket of the tournament. paiN had made their way to the Grand Final after only having lost one match out of ten in the entire tournament. 

In the Grand Final, it started evenly. Overtime was needed on the first map of Dust2, before paiN managed to take home the victory. On ATK's map pick of Inferno, it was a strong CT-side that paved the way for a victory. The tournament was dominated by several Brazilian teams, but both MIBR and GODSENT withdrew after the Group Stage.

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paiN takes home $20,000 and a spot at ESL Pro League Conference Season 17.

The North Americans from ATK were given a hard task last night. As a last-minute replacement team the two Americans, two South Africans, and one Swede on the team had to face FURIA in the opening round of the single-elimination tournament, BLAST Premier Spring Showdown NA.

The match ended as expected with a clear 2-0 win for FURIA. But during the map of Inferno, it was Michael 'Swisher' Schmid from ATK that stole the headlines.

In a 1vs4 situation, the American player suddenly found himself completely alone on the A-bomb site, while all the remaining FURIA players had gone out to hunt him down. He was so alone, that he pulled through a 10-second defuse to win the round.

FURIA will play fellow Brazilians from GODSENT tomorrow at BLAST Premier Spring Showdown.

Swisher

FURIA

ATK has finalized their roster once again with the signing of the former Cloud9 and Extra Salt player Ian “motm” Hardy. The North American AWPer has been offered a trial deal, where he will fill up the gap from Aaron "⁠SloWye⁠" van der Walt, who recently departed the team.

In the announcement, ATK confirms that motm will compete in the upcoming NA ESEA Advanced Season. The move also marks the return of motm, owing to this being his second stint with the team, as he also represented them back in 2019. The NA AWPer has afterwards played at big teams in Cloud9, Extra Salt, and Triumph, however, without any great success. 

Video: The most rare death in CS:GO?

Have you ever seen this before?

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