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GUIDES
Simple Radar
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... but did you ever hear the tale of Cloud9 in Boston?
The grand final is decided. Vitality’s final opponent on the way to eternity will be The MongolZ. An opponent few would have expected for them, history tells us they’ll be in for a much tougher game than the online experts might expect them to be.
Can they do it? Or will we suddenly be forgetting about the time that FaZe Clan choked a 15-11 lead on…
Why the hell would you float one of your opponent’s best maps in the veto in a semi-final of the biggest tournament of the year? Buckle up, because we’ve got the answer.
Let’s approach this analysis from a bit of an unorthodox angle: looking at map two first, Inferno.
By all means, Inferno seems to be the map that Vitalit want to play the most. It’s their first pick in most cases and they look to be very comfortable on it. MOUZ knows they struggle on it, especially against Vitality.
However, this time they come prepared. MOUZ have done their homework, and catch Vitality off guard.
Brollan and his men take both pistols, struggle a bit here and there, but overall, just four rounds go the way of Vitality. They don’t shut down ZywOo – who gets a 1.62 rating on that map – but the rest of Vitality looks lost, and the team as a whole is just unable to get a foothold.
This is great prep from MOUZ and should have won them the series.
Should have, but didn’t. Why? Because Vitality did their homework as well.
Historically, in this Top 2 head-to-head, the only map MOUZ has been able to effectively take is Mirage. It’s their strong suit, it’s their castle, their rock. So, how do XTQZZZ and apEX outwit their adversary? They study every move, prepare for every exec, and predict every lurk.
During map one – which should’ve been a doozy for MOUZ – Vitality pre-emptively made MOUZ feel what MOUZ would make them feel on Inferno. Complicated sentence, but stay with us.
Rock their base, shake them to the core. It was like Vitality were playing with radar cheats on. And so, the score went the other way around in that first map, with MOUZ managing to put just eight on the scoreboard.
Circling back, this is where that Train float comes back into play. Why did MOUZ do that? Because they weren’t expecting to go to map three.
MOUZ were so sure they would take Mirage and Inferno with their solid base on the former and their hard study session on the latter, that they failed to see the danger lurking in map three. That’s why we’ve never seen a team more lost on Train than MOUZ were right then and there.
13-6 and bye bye Major dreams. Vitality moves on to the Grand Final.
Maybe we’re just overthinking it, maybe we’re right. We’d like to think we’re right.
Who are we kidding?
If you had told us paiN vs. The MongolZ was going to be a semi-final at the start of this thing...we probably would've believed you. We're sick like that.
The Mongolian side had a lethargic start to the series, conceding the pistol and following four rounds to an energetic paiN defense. They even had a great read to go B on the fifth round, but nqz shut it down with some savvy positioning. B site is no stranger to Brazilian AWP brilliance.
Little did paiN know, but that was the last round they'd win for the remainder of the map.
The MongolZ took a timeout, calmly talked things over, and answered back with a somewhat chaotic A-split. They didn't even need 910's AWP to get things going. After a rocky start, and with the monkey finally off their back, they proceeded to go into complete cruise control.
MongolZ took complete control of the rest of the half, and that continued into their CT side, capitalized by mzinho spoiling a bomb plant with a smoke spam, following it up with a flying MP9 off of Stairs to take down two more Brazilians. A Mongolian MP9 rarely arrives lubed.
Everything felt like a foregone conclusion after that, and the Brazilian side just couldn't buy an opening kill anywhere. On Round 18, a rare miss from 910 gave them an opening. A sliver of hope. But they just couldn't convert.
The MongolZ started Mirage questionably, but nobody had any questions after they put in a 13-0 run to win their map pick. Onto Anubis.
Spoiler alert: no further questions were asked of The Mongolz.
The map kicked off with shades of Groundhog Day; a pistol round win from paiN gave us pause that this one might be different, but that was short lived.
In Round three, the Mongolians hit the B site with an authoritative split, and snow took it upon himself to underhand a flash through the CT smoke in an attempt to stall the plant. He was punished, and that moment was a great analogue for the whole series.
paiN was throwing hail-mary passes with double digits on the clock. For you Europeans, that’s like playing long balls right from kick off. Their mental was entirely broken, and The MongolZ knew they had it wrapped up in the very early stages. The hearty Mongolian smiles were brighter than the monitors they peeked out from behind.
The Brazilian side was clawing for any possible advantage they could glean; they even had a 2v1 against Senzu on A in the tenth round, but he shut the door with clinical precision. He did it again in Round 15 with an ice cold full-stick of the bomb. Pros. Don’t. Fake.
910 put a bow on the series with a triple from Connector, and just like that, not only did The MongolZ become the first East Asian team to make a Major final, they’re also the youngest.
Pimp said it best in the post-game: “Just some kids playing Counter-Strike.”
And so, it all comes down to this. The final game before history is made.
History, of course, has already been written during this Major. The MongolZ are the first Asian team and the youngest team to ever reach a Major final. A feat that is nothing but incredible. Their awakening on stage has been a long time coming, and it could really shake things up, not just in the final, but for the rest of the year, too.
On the other end of the stage, though, is Vitality. The final boss.
A team that came into the Major unbeaten since February, their streak was promptly broken in their opening game by a plucky Legacy team that defied all expectations. But that defeat hasn’t bothered Vitality one bit. In fact, it may have only served to supercharge them.
A dominant force, Vitality have breezed past nearly every opponent they have faced since, with only their surprise map loss to MOUZ on Inferno serving as a blip on an otherwise perfect record since that anomalous loss to Legacy.
With the weight of a win streak no longer bearing down upon their shoulders, Vitality have been able to focus solely on their one goal: The trophy that will cement their run in the last five months as the greatest of all time.
Because, in all honesty, that is what we’re dealing with.
In an era of donk’s brilliance, of Falcons’ money, of a MOUZ team who can take anyone in the world down, Vitality have managed to usher in an era of dominance unseen in Counter-Strike for a number of years now.
There’s no caveat to this run, no post-COVID dead teams, no meta perversion à la Astralis, no closest rival losing their IGL because of whatever-the-f–ck-happened-there, this is just a team that is simply greater than all of their closest competitors.
But none of that will matter unless they win in Austin.
Vitality’s season, for all of the high moments, will all crumble to nothing if they don’t manage to lift that Major trophy. Like Liquid in 2019, their era will forever be denied, because such is the importance of the only tournament that enters your name into Counter-Strike lore for eternity.
With that in mind, we do expect Vitality to do what needs to be done in the final, but that doesn’t mean we’re counting out The MongolZ.
When it clicked for them on stage it was always going to click in a big way, and it’s not like they haven’t pushed Vitality to their absolute limits before. It’s not even like the fifth-highest ranked team hasn’t ever managed to pull off Major magic in America before.
People are already quick to be writing this game off, already pulling the trigger on the “Vitality Mickey Mouse Major” agenda for the second time. But we truly don’t think they could be more wrong.
Both of these teams have given everything they have to get to this spot, neither one of them is going to let that trophy slip away without fighting until the bitter end.
We really think we’re in for a treat, and we can’t f–cking wait for it.
