A Portuguese Cinderella

Counter-Strike has seen its share of Cinderella runs, but nothing quite like this.

The stage: Cologne. The damsel: SAW.

In an arena dominated by FaZe jerseys — seriously, 8 out of 10 fans were repping FaZe — SAW pulled off what everyone was secretly thinking but wouldn’t dare to say.

The underdog magic was in the air, and we could feel it. What if?

Inferno was supposed to be a breeze for FaZe — it’s one of their strongest maps, so it should have been easy, right? Wrong.

They got steamrolled by ewjerkz, who put up an absurd 1.97 rating. SAW dominated, taking space at will and playing with confidence. FaZe looked lost.

After that first map, the crowd began to warm up to SAW. They had just witnessed what this team was capable of, and for many, it was their first real taste of SAW’s game.

Despite Anubis being a shaky map for FaZe, they managed to scrape by with a hard-fought 13-11 win. It was one of those games where pretty much every round could’ve gone either way.

A missed smoke in a post-plant situation likely cost SAW the 12th round — and possibly the 2-0 sweep —  but they didn’t let it rattle them.

The squad came back rejuvenated for Nuke, with MUTiRis leading the charge. His 1v4 clutch was nothing short of artistry, pulling SAW back into the game after a lackluster four-round CT side. It was a moment of pure brilliance that had the crowd erupting — so much so that we even spotted some FaZe fans cheering.

After a tense OT, SAW pulled off the upset, sending their small group of Portuguese fans into a frenzy that completely overshadowed the sea of red and black.

Strong fundamentals and beautiful CS — at the end of the day, that’s what it’s all about.

MUTiRiS shuts down the nuclear plant

What stage problem?

MOUZ cruised past an intermittent G2 team to set up a semi-final berth and pick up their first win ever in the LANXESS.

It was quite a simple 2-0 affair on Dust 2 and Mirage, with G2 dominating the highlight reel including eye-catching clips from NiKo, m0NESY, malbs, and Snax. But they found themselves broken and penniless at every turn, thanks to MOUZ’ total team domination.

G2 had all the big moments on Dust 2 but to no avail.

Snax’ Five-Seven triple felt like a moment that should have mattered — three MOUZ players came out B and Snax was on an island, but he mowed down three, with the third being a ridiculous one-tap.

But it didn’t matter, at all.

MOUZ ran away with the next round and waltzed out B a few rounds later, naded huNter- to death, and stole a 4v5 without doing anything impressive.

That was kind of the story of Dust 2. MOUZ did the basics, G2 did the flashy stuff, and not a lot else. As they say, steady wins the race, and MOUZ walked away with the win.

The story was similar on Mirage — once more, Snax put up a highlight that showed why G2 signed him over HooXi. But then he called a T-side that showed why people weren’t so hot on the move. Far too many times G2 walked into crosshairs, dry, one by one, and died.

MOUZ held their nerve on stage to take this one 2-0—that is true, and that is worth celebrating, but we did not see a cohesive G2 unit at any point. They had individual moments but nothing as a team, and MOUZ was coasting to the finish line on both maps.

Perhaps this is a catalyst moment for MOUZ, but it feels like it has to be a moment of self-reflection for a lackluster G2 team as well.

Two more thigh-rubbers coming right up

ZywOo will be gracing the stage today as he looks to ruin the Portuguese party in the opening game.

Vitality will be looking to move past the dangerous SAW and make their way into the grand final, but as FaZe learned today, it won’t be easy.

It’s a massive opportunity for SAW, who’ve earned their rank among the greats by doing something few teams ever do - beating FaZe in an arena - and look like a genuine top team right now. arrozdoce, and ewjerkz are proving themselves to be one of the scariest duos in the world, and Spinx and flameZ will have to be on top form.

The thing is, FaZe came pretty close even with broky playing like Jayzwalkingz, so you have to imagine with ZywOo it will be a different story.

We then see a triumphant MOUZ return to take on the best team in the world, NAVI. That’s just like, our opinion, man.

NAVI have been terrifying as of late, and as good as MOUZ were yesterday it was against an unimpressive G2. This is a different animal.

You might have got over your stage yips, MOUZ, but we’re about to find out if you’ve really got the huevos to take the biggest scalp around. torzsi is probably the key - he went toe-to-toe with m0NESY and didn’t look out of place, and you have to think that he’s the main route to victory.

For NAVI, it could be any of jL, w0nderful, or b1t, who are all capable of being the best player on the server at any given moment.

This one promises fireworks, and the LANXESS demands them.

This TL;DR was written by aizyesque and shoko.
Welshy coded the email and Incipiens copy edited.

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