Na`Vi see off mousesports to reach ESL One Cologne playoffs

Natus Vincere are through to the quarter-finals of ESL One Cologne 2019 after beating MOUZ in a three-map series.

The CIS giants will face the losing side of the Astralis vs Ninjas in Pyjamas match in the first round of the playoffs on Friday after a long series that could have easily gone awry for them as they gave up an 11-4 lead on Inferno and had to come from behind to win the game after surviving four map points.

MOUZ, who could not get the revenge they were looking for after losing to Na`Vi on the first day of the event, responded well on Dust2, where they had the upper hand from the get-go, but they were once again bested on Train, this time by an even more one-sided scoreline.

Oleksandr "⁠s1mple⁠" Kostyliev, who produced another phenomenal performance, is not thinking about tomorrow's game, though, and has his eyes set on the semi-final stage as he seeks revenge against his former team of Liquid after his infamous knife blunder that potentially cost his team the match against the North Americans on Tuesday.

"It does not matter who we face [in the quarter-finals]," the Ukrainian star said after the match. "The team I want to face is Liquid. I think we beat them two days ago and I just want to play them again. It is always a great game against them. They are strong, like Astralis, and it is interesting to play them."

A solid start on the defensive side of Inferno saw Natus Vincere take a 3-0 lead after winning the pistol round and fending off MOUZ' force-buy attempts. Those early rounds had been highly contested, however, so when Finn "⁠karrigan⁠" Andersen's charges got a round on the board, they immediately broke Na`Vi's economy, leading to a 3-3 stalemate.

The rest of the half was dominated by Na`Vi, who cruised to an 11-4 lead, but after the break they began to play at a walking pace. MOUZ kept their defense very tight and reached map point without dropping a single round since the start of the half. The Russian team, who had managed just one bomb plant by then, finally woke up and began to create holes in the mouz defence, winning four rounds in a row to equalise the score at 15-15.

The first overtime could not determine a winner as both teams picked up two rounds on their CT side, but then Natus Vincere took control of proceedings, winning two rounds in both halves to seal a hard-fought 22-19 victory.

The CIS giants could not capitalise on that momentum as they looked way off the pace for the vast majority of Dust2, their own map pick. After collapsing against a force-buy, Na`Vi found their footing in the game and took a two-round lead, but then MOUZ tightened up their defense and won seven rounds on the trot to make it a 10-5 half.

A trio of fast s1mple kills near the car helped Na`Vi to win a much-needed pistol round and mount a slight comeback into the map. However, their efforts were in vain: MOUZ took control of proceedings once they had money to work with and won six consecutive rounds with some great individual plays by Özgür "⁠woxic⁠" Eker and David "⁠frozen⁠" Čerňanský.

It all came down to Train, the exact same map where these two teams had met on the opening day of the event. Natus Vincere had shown a lacklustre Terrorist side back then, but this time around things were quite different. After a slow start to the game, Danylo "⁠Zeus⁠" Teslenko's troops clicked into a higher gear and shut down any chances of their opponents stringing rounds together.

MOUZ managed to head into the break with six rounds on the board, but the scoreline could have been much worse for them if not for karrigan, who single-handedly won two rounds for his team towards the end of the half with the AWP.

The second half began at a rapid pace as neither side seemed able to dictate the pace of the game, but Na`Vi set up a very compact defense towards the mid-way point of the half and ran away with the lead, winning five rounds in a row en route to a clean 16-9 finish off the back of a great performance from their dynamic duo of s1mple and Denis "⁠electroNic⁠" Sharipov.