Natus Vincere, Cloud9 pick up victories in Lisbon

Natus Vincere and Cloud9 are off to a great start at the BLAST Pro Series Lisbon after beating Ninjas in Pyjamas and MIBR, respectively.

The match between Natus Vincere and Ninjas in Pyjamas was played on Overpass, where the Ukrainians took control of proceedings after winning their Terrorist pistol and the subsequent anti-eco.

Ninjas in Pyjamas responded well, losing a single round of the next five, but Danylo "⁠Zeus⁠" Teslenko's men were in charge and eventually picked up an 8-5 lead without much effort. The Swedes got back to winning ways by the end of the half, stringing two rounds together to bring the gap to a minimum.

The second half started off just like the first, with Natus Vincere bagging two rounds in a row before Ninjas in Pyjamas won the first gun round. This time around, Na`Vi did not let their opponents take any control of map, continuously denying Ninjas in Pyjamas's strategies to hit match-point, 15-8, with Oleksandr "⁠s1mple⁠" Kostyliev leading the way with 24 frags.

Ninjas in Pyjamas still found a lifeline in the match by racking up four rounds, but it was in vain, though, as Natus Vincere kept their cool to seal the deal, 16-12.

On the B stream, Marcelo "⁠coldzera⁠" David opened up the action on Mirage with a triple-kill to help his team win their CT pistol. In the first gun round, MIBR looked set to further add to their lead, but Robin "⁠flusha⁠" Rönnquist came up huge with a quad-kill to turn around a 2v5 situation, inspiring Cloud9 to make it 3-2 in their favor.

That lead would not last long, however, as MIBR went on a massive run to eventually go up 9-4. Still, in the next two rounds, Cloud9 managed to reduce the deficit to 6-9 on the back of a double-kill and an ace that included a 1v4 clutch from Ismail "⁠refrezh⁠" Ali.

MIBR started well in the second half, winning three rounds in a row to increase their lead to 12-6. However, a successful round with nothing but pistols marked the beginning of a great streak from Cloud9, who remained focused to bring it back and finish things off 16-14.