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Danish Counter-Strike is in shambles. dev1ce got carried, Astralis are bad, Heroic are cheaters and South is like North, but worse.
Round Robin Bad. NIP...Good?
Ninjas. In. Pyjamas. We thought we’d be roasting them this morning after they lost to FURIA, but then they went and beat Gambit 2-0 to secure 3rd place in Group D. Now that is definitely worth $1 million dollars.
Except, it wasn’t because of dev1ce*.* LNZ won a huge 1v3 to close inferno, and REZ and Hampus did most of the fragging in the series.
That might be a good thing though, reminding dev1ce of the reason he joined the NIP project in the first place. A project that now has REZ tied down for four more years - yep, you read that right. Suddenly HUNDEN’s two year ban doesn’t seem ‘too long for esports’.
After the big upset versus NIP, FURIA still had to beat Liquid to qualify. Despite getting to overtime in map 3, buoyed by an incredible KSCERATO performance, they just couldn't get it done.
But take nothing away from coach Guerri and FURIA: their run has to be up there as one of the most memorable coach/stand-in performances of all time.
ESL, though, will be relieved that they finally don't need a tiebreaker to sort out 3rd place. Speaking of of tiebreakers, we've got a little correction to our previous edition:
The tiebreaker for Pro League is not based on round difference, but rather a head-to-head map difference. That’s why Gambit are 1st ahead of Liquid, despite having 10 less round difference.
Which is better. But not good. Anything that requires this much reading to understand objectively sucks, which is why we’re still leading the “bring back Swiss” movement.
Group D has also revealed another stick to beat Round Robin with: How often teams have nothing to play for. Gambit and Liquid were locked into playoffs before they even played last night. Which, along with FURIA beating them with a stand-in, leaves two fat asterisks on NIP's qualification.
But, qualifying is still something that FaZe, G2, and Astralis all failed to do. And it would be wrong to dismiss a young team after just four months together. Leave that to Cloud9's management.
So don’t rule out an upset at that home major just yet – just keep monitors well out of dev1ce’s way.
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Heroic or scummy?
Oh brother...
As if you were watching your regular telenovela - but in Danish - last Friday saw another instalment of "The HUNDEN Drama". Although in this episode, a few other characters took centre stage.
HUNDEN took to Danish cable network, TV 2, with more information and evidence implicating his former teammates in the entire coaching bug affair.
This time, it seems pretty solid. Good for him, bad for Heroic.
His first piece of evidence are some server logs from a game where he used the coaching bug. According to HUNDEN, TeSeS helped him get in to a special position with a better view by boosting him.
The coaching bug was triggered in warmup, and with TeSeS being the only other player in the server – and the position being unreachable without a boost – the evidence seems pretty damn conclusive.
The second piece of evidence are some DMs with niko who was a part of Heroic at the time. In this conversation, niko seemingly admits that all players must've known of the bug. Yeesh.
Of course Heroic, who were asked to comment by TV 2, went on to tell off HUNDEN, saying he should "grow up" and "take responsibility for his actions". But Heroic, here's a tip: Chili stains are pretty hard to clean.
Yeah we like to give ourselves a pat on the back. Sue us.
Ones to watch
If anything qualifies as a rite of passage in CS:GO, it would be going through the gruesome gauntlet of a weekend full of open qualifier games, just to lose at the end.
What doesn't kill you or give you an ulcer, makes you stronger, as they say.
The open qualifiers is also where a lot of talent is first discovered. Diamonds are created under pressure, and the constant do-or-die situation means that the pressure is unrelenting.
This weekend, we had several qualifiers going on: IEM Fall 2021 EU qualifier (1-3), Nordic Blast Premier Fall Showdown qualifier and V4 Future Festival qualifier.
Here are some of the things we learned:
- Fnatic is not just a rollercoaster team. They sometimes fall completely off the tracks, like when they lose to 00Nation, or O PLANO as they were called just yesterday.
- Movistar Riders haven't lost a step since getting rid of smooya, as they qualified to IEM Fall 2021 together with Copenhagen Flames.
- Copenhagen Flames have in roeJ someone who deserves to play at a higher level. We wouldn't be surprised to see him that chance soon.
- MAD Lions and Fiend also qualified to IEM Fall 2021 - the former without dropping a single map.
- GORILLAZ, headlined by flusha, sunNy and sergej, just isn't going anywhere. Not even a top 4 in any of the qualifiers they attended.
Elsewhere Sinners continued to absolutely demolish the T2 competition, with oskar dropping a masterclass versus Akuma in the V4 Qualifier final.
And while the Tunesian-Latvian-Jordanian-Iraqi mix of NASR didn't manage to qualify to any of the events, the #216 in the world took down some heavy hitters - including GORILLAZ, Tricked and an overtime victory against LDLC.
It might not be Tier 1, but it's still really exciting.
No more free AWPs?
- Jame is said to be absolutely in the mud. Poor lad could lose his entire funding.
- It's funny when it happens to NA, but we actually liked the Aussies...
- Seems like cold and fer have yet realised what their own level is at. Shame.
- As a 00's kid, this new name doesn't even resonate with me.
- Even s1mple knows a goat when he sees one.
- What the second best Danish player said. You know who's first.
- Call it all you want ESL, we know it as the Esports Fan League. Those bastards took an unoriginal idea and executed it differently, unbelievable.
