Astralis edge past Liquid in São Paulo opener

Astralis are off to a great start at BLAST Pro Series São Paulo after beating Liquid in their first of four Dust2 encounters in the round-robin stage.

The headline match of the first round in São Paulo, featuring the current top two teams in the world, began with a dominant start from Liquid, who jumped out to a 4-0 lead on the Terrorist side, building on a clean B execute in the pistol round. Astralis then came close to getting their first round on the board, but Keith "⁠NAF⁠" Markovic pulled off a 1v2 clutch, propelling his side into a 6-0 advantage.

Things were starting to look bad for Astralis, but then the Danes finally put their foot down and held back the North American offense. With Emil "⁠Magisk⁠" Reif leading the charge, the current Major champions dominated the second portion of the half, though they still found themselves trailing their opponents before switching sides.

Magisk was in impressive form throughout the match

Now playing on the CT side, Liquid further added to their lead with a phenomenal B setup in the pistol round as they shut down the site thanks to some stellar teamwork from Jake "⁠Stewie2K⁠" Yip and Nick "⁠nitr0⁠" Cannella. The game then entered a scrappy period as rounds went back and forth and neither side could stamp their authority on the game, but Astralis took control of proceedings and went on a five-round streak, with clutches from Magisk and Nicolai "⁠device⁠" Reedtz leaving Liquid frustrated.

With no margin for error, Liquid dug deep and equalised the score at 13-13, but Astralis would not let the game get out of hand and won three in a row to pick up their first win on Brazilian soil.

BLAST Pro Series São Paulo 2019Best of 1

Astralis

Matchpage

16

13

22nd March 2019

Liquid

16

Dust2

13

Astralis	K - D	+/-	ADR	KAST	Rating2.0
Emil 'Magisk' ReifMagisk	24 - 16	+8	93.2	72.4%	1.36
Nicolai 'device' Reedtzdevice	22 - 17	+5	72.5	65.5%	1.20
Andreas 'Xyp9x' HøjslethXyp9x	17 - 20	-3	72.1	58.6%	0.93
Peter 'dupreeh' Rasmussendupreeh	19 - 21	-2	62.1	72.4%	0.91
Lukas 'gla1ve' Rossandergla1ve	9 - 24	-15	50.7	62.1%	0.55

Liquid	K - D	+/-	ADR	KAST	Rating2.0
Keith 'NAF' MarkovicNAF	21 - 16	+5	88.4	75.9%	1.33
Jake 'Stewie2K' YipStewie2K	25 - 21	+4	83.1	79.3%	1.23
Nick 'nitr0' Cannellanitr0	20 - 18	+2	68.2	75.9%	1.06
Jonathan 'EliGE' JablonowskiEliGE	19 - 18	+1	68.9	62.1%	1.01
Russel 'Twistzz' Van DulkenTwistzz	13 - 18	-5	61.6	65.5%	0.92

Group A

TEAM

M

P

Ninjas in Pyjamas

1

3

ENCE

1

3

Astralis

1

3

Liquid

1

0

MIBR

1

0

FaZe

1

0