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Everything you gotta know from CS:GO without wasting time on news sites, reddit or twitter.
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NA CS is in some deep trouble, FURIA haven’t had the dream start (to say the least) and TYLOO are rolling back the years.
Reports of NA’s revival have been greatly exaggerated
Source: BLAST Premiere
Eesh.
If you’re American, or Canadian, we’re going to give you the chance now to a̶p̶o̶l̶o̶g̶i̶s̶e̶ scroll down to the next story and read about some dodgy Brazilian and English teams.
Three NA teams came in, and on the first day of elimination games, three NA teams went out. Complexity, Liquid and EG all lost their elimination BO3s and will have a long flight home.
Together.
There, they might be greeted by the newly-jobless Ryan, who will now have to seek a nomadic lifestyle.
Complexity were up to bat first, but were struck out by MIBR with a player called exit topfragging. That should have been seen as foreshadowing, but they wanted to believe.
There’s not really much to talk about with Complexity; they were flat, lacklustre and, we believe as the kids say, ‘mid’.
Liquid can count themselves unlucky; despite finishing third in their group, they were delegated the unenviable task of defeating the beast. s1mple did not want to lose, picking up double the amount of kills of anyone on his team in game one.
That’s bad luck.
NA had one last hit, and it came down to the ol’ reliable. autimatic was electric on Overpass, as EG set up an upset by taking map one over BIG.
But BIG do as BIG do; with their typical miserly, monkish gameplay, they restricted and constricted NA’s final hope, choking them out on Vertigo.
Of all the ways to go, to have it end on Vertigo? That’s just no way for your hopes and dreams to die.
We suppose the good news for NA fans is that you can support, erm, Twistzz and FaZe? They made it out top of their group, so you’ll at least be interested ‘til Saturday night.
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The Pinnacle of Counter-Strike
Panic stations!
FURIA decided to announce they were planning to win tournaments with this line-up on the same day that they got battered by Wisla Krakow, which is excellent optics, we must say.
They weren’t the only ones, either; they and fnatic were both invited to Pinnacle Cup, both given a bye into the quarter-finals, and both exited in their first game.
So these teams are just doomed. Unlucky.
Well, let’s give them a bit of leeway. This was their first games back after the player break, and they came in cold against teams who had had... well, the rest of the tournament to warm up.
Wisla Krakow didn’t even take a break. These guys have been grinding harder than Bob Burnquist. That might be a dated reference - almost as stuck in the past as Brazilian Counter-Strike.
fnatic also had to play Apeks, who are on paper an extremely solid team. While we weren’t expecting AcilioN to be up there, we’re very happy to see jkaem looking hot again.
Like, in the server. He never stopped being hot outside of it.
Apeks lost the final to K23, who also managed to bin off Heroic en route to the final. They’re becoming something of a thorn in Denmark’s side, recently; as pointed out by Pimp on Twitter.
K23 are becoming a real problem in the tier 2 scene as they’re killing off the middle of the pack and dealing with the tier 1 teams who dare to enter their realm.
Keep an eye on ‘em.
Teach us how to game, MSL!
Tune in to this week's episode of Overtime on Inferno where your favorite hosts aizyesque and Logan Ramhap go deep on the biggest news in CS:GO:
- How much MSL’s megamind is worth per hour
- Why alarm bells are ringing for Complexity
- The ‘correct’ pronunciation of Wisla Krakow (we hope)
TYLOO save BnTeT from free agent hell
Source: ESL
If TYLOO was a player, they would be BnTeT. Erratic, much better at home, but most importantly really damn fun.
So the news of him returning to TYLOO seems to be a no-brainer. They get their old star and IGL back ahead of an all-important 2022 season where the squad are going to try their best to stay in Europe.
And BnTeT isn’t just an IGL, he’s probably the best Asian player even after two quite disappointing years at Gen G and Extremum. And when we say disappointing, it wasn’t exactly BnTeT’s fault - he’s only had one negative event in the last two years.
Two years in the tier 1.5 (sorry, Australia. not sorry, NA) international scene can’t have harmed BnTeT and if he can get back to his superstar numbers of 2017 then who knows, TYLOO should be a good underdog team again.
This might be a bit of wishful thinking on our part. The more TYLOO win, the more of their crazy off-meta games (and Summer’s crazy flicks) we get to see.
But re-adding BnTeT should be a good start in that direction. Touch wood.
Beer, chocolate, waffles and Counter-Strike
Illustration by NovaH
When we think of Belgium, we think of chocolate, good beer, really good beer, speaking far too many languages and a couple of VALORANT players.
And good beer. We can’t forget that.
We don’t really think of CSGO; but PGL are attempting to change that.
No, they’re not dragging ScreaM and Nivera back home, kicking and screaming. They’re not giving everybody in Gold Nova and above a crate of beer to help them aim. They’re bringing the biggest and best event in CSGO to France 2.0 Belgium, and more precisely, Antwerp.
Why Belgium, you ask?
Erm, good question, and one we’re struggling to find answers for. While it’s a lovely place, relatively inexpensive and simple to get to, it doesn’t scream ‘Counter-Strike’, does it?
Realistically, it doesn’t matter. It’s going to be a blast, because it’s going to be a Counter-Strike Major, in a decent timezone for most of us, on LAN. Fingers crossed.
It’s PGL again, which means we’re a little worried for the audio, but we don’t think we’ll have the same debacle over talent. For one, we’re not sure the old boys’ club that Bardolph bitched about will be in attendance; Richard Lewis has already stated he’ll step aside for new talent, like Sjokz.
If you aren’t au fait with Sjokz, you’ll love her. Just trust us. She’s lovely.
Scrawny and launders have to be there too, for us, as they’ve been absolutely killing it for the last year, and it was heretical to leave them out last time.
This does mean that we’re having two Majors this year, with the second supposedly being in Brazil later in the year. We’re BACK back, boys and girls.
Are you a boomer with terrible taste in maps?
- Then we’ve got just the tweet for you.
- You ever ragequit your team on ESEA after losing in Open? Well pros do it too.
- Valve remembered CS exists and gifted us some stickers.
- And snuck in the now traditional small-change-that-makes-pros-cry.
- Remember Zero? Well he’s found a way to save you from tinnitus.
- And pashaBICEPS, if CS hasn’t given him tinnitus already, might need it come Saturday.
- Staying in Poland, MICHU gave a spicy interview to Cybersport, revealing all about his time at EG. There’s just one catch.
