Guest in Finland – CS-team at Elisa Masters

After their first Major our GL youngsters headed up north to the ELISA Esports Masters in finland. Having BIG, ENCE and Sprout in the bracket, we knew right away that the group stage wouldn’t be a walk in the park.

In the first match against the Finnish team HAVU on Mirage, the order was to win and gain self-confidence. Said and done. We bagged the pistol-round, and after a 1v2 clutch of iM with only 5HP left in the post-plant it was 7:3 for GL. With a solid performance we could clinch the first half for us (11:4). The second one didn’t go that smoothly for us. HAVU somehow launched a comeback, but after a 1v3 AWP clutch by acoR the Finnish (sauna) oven was shut down. With a close but unthreatened 16:13, we entered the tournament. 

In the second matchup we faced ENCE on Vertigo. After a choppy start (0:2), the first half turned out really balanced, with that little bit more luck on our side (8:7). Then ENCE switched up a gear and blew us away in the second half with 2:9. A bitter pill to swallow, but this meant the first defeat (10:16).

Third match was against the – at least on paper – supposedly weaker team HEET. Unfortunately, we couldn’t build on our previous performance and had to admit defeat surprisingly but also clearly with 8:16. This second loss in a row hamstrung our chances for the playoffs tremendously. 

But with a little more pressure, things seemed to go better again against BIG. Losing the first two rounds, a relentless Five-Seven Pistol 4k from Siuhy in the third round woke us up and we managed to grab a comfortable 12:3 lead after a 9-0 run. In the second half, we slackened a bit and BIG took advantage of the moment to close the gap again. We lost the second half, but still managed to win the match 16:14. Close but 

In the last game however, we had the most intense battle of the entire tournament. A triple-overtime-thriller against Team Sprout. Losing the first half (6:9) and facing a 8:14 at some point, it didn’t look bright at all. Just as nobody expected it anymore, the boys pulled an stirring 7:1 stretch out of their sleeves, with Siuhy once again shining with the decisive 3k to secure the tie for overtime. After a constant back and forth, Sprout eventually had the longer breath. Sad to say being edged out by the other side at 23:25. What a game!

Summed up: Despite a promising start and a win against our German rivals from BIG, we were unfortunately knocked out of the tournament at the end of the group stage after a thrilling final match against a mighty Team Sprout.