Vitality are through to the semi-final stage at PGL Masters Bucharest following a 2-1 victory over Natus Vincere, recovering from a one-map deficit to beat Aleksi "Aleksib" Virolainen's troops a second time in this tournament.
NAVI came out with fire in their bellies and picked up a dominant win on Cache, snapping Vitality's eight-game win streak on the map. They were left to rue some costly mistakes on Mirage before turning in a flat showing in the Dust2 decider.
Natus Vincere went for a Cache pick, a surprise decision after first-banning the map in the previous series against Vitality, just two days earlier. After a slow start to their T side, NAVI dictated the tempo with a prolific offense and went on a dominant 7-1 run, with Mihai "iM" Ivan leading the charge with a 1.89 rating and +7.67% round swing.
Aleksib's troops carried that momentum into the second half, winning six rounds without response to close out the map and hand Mathieu "ZywOo" Herbaut his second-lowest Cache rating in CS2.
NAVI picked up where they left off, taking an early lead on Mirage behind a triple kill from Valeriy "b1t" Vakhovskiy in the pistol round. Vitality’s offense looked far livelier this time, winning six rounds in the half, though the scoreline would have been quite different without key clutches from Justinas "jL" Lekavicius and William "mezii" Merriman.
And then ZywOo took over the game. A trio of USP frags marked the start of a dominant half from the French star, who posted a 2.61 rating and a +15.9% round swing on the CT side to lead Vitality to victory. For a short spell, the game appeared to be tilting in NAVI’s favor, but a missed smoke cost them an anti-eco round and killed off any momentum they had gained.
Vitality refused to let up and cruised to an 8-4 lead on the CT side of Dust2 after a one-sided half. Natus Vincere responded with a flawless pistol, but their comeback hopes were immediately crushed as Vitality hit back thanks to a ZywOo Scout triple kill, and then ran away with the game.
Vitality
Dan 'apEX' Madesclaire
Robin 'ropz' Kool
Mathieu 'ZywOo' Herbaut
Shahar 'flameZ' Shushan
William 'mezii' Merriman
Rémy 'XTQZZZ' Quoniam
Mathieu 'ZywOo' HerbautPast 3 months
Justinas 'jL' LekaviciusPast 3 months
Mihai 'iM' IvanPast 3 months
Natus Vincere
Aleksi 'Aleksib' Virolainen
Mihai 'iM' Ivan
Valeriy 'b1t' Vakhovskiy
Ihor 'w0nderful' Zhdanov
Drin 'makazze' Shaqiri
Andrey 'B1ad3' Gorodenskiy
Aleksi 'Aleksib' VirolainenPast 3 months
Valeriy 'b1t' VakhovskiyPast 3 months
William 'mezii' MerrimanPast 3 months