NAVI and G2 put up a stellar show with Inferno going to double-overtime and some amazing individual plays.
It was an elimination match between two of the best teams of the tournament. Navi and G2 met each other in the lower bracket and this time, NAVI survived. Navi defeat G2 in the lower bracket of the BLAST Premier World Finals and will now face the winner of Team Liquid and Astralis.
Curtains down for G2's current roster
The series started on Nuke with NAVI off to a 6-0 start on the T-side. Things looked gloomy for G2, but the team managed to bring it back to a 7-8 half. On Nuke, that’s the best case scenario you could possibly expect after a 0-6 start. The two teams continued trading blocks of rounds through the second half. It was a very close series that came down to some individual greatness.
Ultimately, Navi won Nuke with a 16-14 score. But it was not without some stellar performances by the G2 players. Niko finished Nuke with 35 kills and just 18 deaths. No one on NAVI came close to his performance with Perfecto and S1mple leading the CIS scoreboiard with 23 and 22 kills respectively. On Navi it was a team effort and that’s how they pulled ahead on Nuke.
But Nuke was NAVI’s pick and we now had Inferno, G2’s choice. After the close rounds on Nuke, G2 had the momentum and slight advantage on Nuke. But the series went into double OT before a beautiful performance by hunter~ helped G2 seal Inferno.
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The third map, Mirage, was all NAVI in the first half as they blazed through to a 11-4 start. It was only a matter of time after that as G2's strats were simply not working. Navi had an answer to G2's plays on the T-side, and that was a big reason for the team's disastrous start.
They punished our defaults very well. They were getting too many picks. S1mple had an amazing game. But our defaults were not working. When your default doesn't work, it's hard to find the key rounds.
The lower bracket matches saw Navi defeat G2, but it was an extremely close series that could have gone either way. As the Number 1 team in the world, Navi's position as the best might be under threat. However, this was G2's last opportunity to threaten Navi with its current roster.
"I think we should be satisfied with the results we had. We all knew our roster is not a contender to win all the titles. but we could have won here and there. We are satisfied with the results on LAN. For the online period, we are not very porous cause we have struggled a lot. Each player on this team has given his everything to succeed. That is why we were in the top 3 throughout the whole year. The team put extra effort to make it work." - Niko said to Banks in the post-match interview.
The BLAST Premier World Final is the final big event of the year and features some of the best teams in action. The tournament has quite a few ‘dead teams’, teams that will see confirmed roster changes after the event. With a million dollar prize pool, this would be a nice trophy addition for any team that can secure the trophy.
You can catch all the BLAST Premier action live on Twitch.
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