StarLadder Major 2019 Challengers StageSyman, DreamEaters open Major with upsets over Vitality, NRG
The StarLadder Major began with two huge upsets as CIS duo Syman and DreamEaters bested Vitality and NRG, respectively.
The French giants, who had the top seed of this stage, came out the brighter of the two sides in their Dust2 match against Syman and strolled to a 3-0 lead, but the landscape of the game changed immediately once their opponents had money to work with. The CIS side kept a water-tight defense for the rest of the half secured a massive 10-5 advantage, with Maksim "t0rick" Zaikin sitting on a 20-7 score.
Syman piled more misery on their opponents and further added to their lead after preventing Nathan "NBK-" Schmitt and Alex "ALEX" McMeekin from clutching rounds early in the second half.
Mathieu "ZywOo" Herbaut, who was struggling to provide any sort of impact, finally woke up when Vitality were down 14-5 and put his team back in the game with a series of multi-kills. But Syman were by then too far ahead and t0rick continued to tear through the French defense, racking up 30 kills as his team picked up a surprisingly easy victory.
 Vitality |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20 - 19 | +1 | 91.3 | 58.3% | 1.21 | |
| 18 - 19 | -1 | 77.3 | 79.2% | 1.12 | |
| 17 - 18 | -1 | 68.4 | 62.5% | 0.93 | |
| 10 - 18 | -8 | 64.2 | 54.2% | 0.69 | |
| 10 - 21 | -11 | 50.1 | 66.7% | 0.62 |
 Syman |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 30 - 13 | +17 | 107.3 | 70.8% | 1.76 | |
| 22 - 15 | +7 | 108.5 | 83.3% | 1.48 | |
| 15 - 14 | +1 | 63.5 | 70.8% | 0.99 | |
| 16 - 17 | -1 | 86.6 | 66.7% | 0.98 | |
| 12 - 17 | -5 | 54.8 | 66.7% | 0.81 |
Over on the secondary stream, NRG were caught off-guard by DreamEaters' strong start to the game, forcing Peter "stanislaw" Jarguz to call a tactical pause when the score was 5-0 in the Russians' favour. Tsvetelin "CeRq" Dimitrov then single-handedly put NRG on the board, but there was no follow-up as the CIS side responded immediately. DreamEaters continued to add rounds to their tally before a late resurgence from NRG allowed them to cut the gap to five rounds before the break.
Now playing on the Terrorist side, DreamEaters replied immediately after losing the pistol round and went on a tear to secure nine match points. It looked the game was about to come to a close, but Svyatoslav "svyat" Dovbakh's troops the mental issues that had already plagued them in the Minors and allowed NRG to mount a spectacular comeback and force overtime.
In the end, NRG's comeback efforts would amount to nothing. The North Americans' double AWP setup earned them two rounds on the defense, but DreamEaters had a flawless CT side and picked up three rounds to walk away with the victory.
  NRG |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 32 - 24 | +8 | 83.6 | 80.6% | 1.37 | |
| 28 - 22 | +6 | 85.3 | 75.0% | 1.22 | |
| 22 - 26 | -4 | 79.9 | 69.4% | 1.06 | |
| 24 - 25 | -1 | 72.5 | 61.1% | 0.98 | |
| 20 - 26 | -6 | 59.5 | 66.7% | 0.83 |
 DreamEaters |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 31 - 24 | +7 | 79.2 | 66.7% | 1.15 | |
| 22 - 28 | -6 | 85.9 | 72.2% | 1.05 | |
| 21 - 23 | -2 | 67.8 | 75.0% | 1.04 | |
| 26 - 25 | +1 | 76.6 | 63.9% | 1.02 | |
| 23 - 26 | -3 | 57.7 | 61.1% | 0.86 |
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