fnatic squeeze past MIBR in Odense

fnatic live to fight another day at the ESL Pro League Season 10 Finals after taking down MIBR in a close three-map series.

The Swedish team will move on to Group A's upper bracket final, in which they will play for their tournament life against 100 Thieves. After narrowly beating HEROIC in the first lower bracket round, fnatic had to work hard to move past a stubborn MIBR, who may have just played their final match with Lucas "⁠LUCAS1⁠" Teles as the team look to sign Argentinian talent meyern from Sharks ahead of cs_summit 5.

Considering the Brazilians' current predicament, it is difficult not to feel that fnatic's victory was too close for comfort. The Swedes were lackluster from a tactical perspective and thus had to rely on individual talent throughout the series, which went to all three maps as they failed to capitalise on a record-breaking performance from Freddy "⁠KRIMZ⁠" Johansson on Dust2. Ludvig "⁠Brollan⁠" Brolin, who was sitting at the bottom of the scoreboard heading into Vertigo, gave fnatic the edge on the final map after Robin "⁠flusha⁠" Rönnquist had played a key role on Inferno.

The entire first half of Inferno was a scrappy affair: neither team managed to get ahead by more than a couple of rounds as mistakes were made on both sides and the Desert Eagles often reigned supreme. As the game wore on, Jesper "⁠JW⁠" Wecksell picked up the pace on the AWP, but as the half came to an end only one round separated the two sides.

MIBR equalised the score after switching to the T side with a B execute but there was no follow-up as fnatic instantly rallied back on a force buy. The Swedish team took advantage of that momentum and ran away with the game, constantly keeping the Brazilian players at bay en route to a dominant victory on their own map pick, with flusha ending the game with 28 kills to his name.

fnatic got off to a flying start on Dust2 and raced to a 5-0 lead on the CT side. MIBR then finally got on the board after pushing the A site unopposed, with Fernando "⁠fer⁠" Alvarenga then raising eyebrows with a 1v2 clutch. The Brazilians lost their grip on the game afterwards, allowing fnatic to put together another string of rounds, but, much to everyone's surprise, they narrowed the gap to just one round before the break thanks to a fruitful end to the half.

The second half began in the same manner as that of the previous map as MIBR took the pistol round but failed to capitalise on that. KRIMZ, who had ended the first half with 24 frags, continued his onslaught on the Terrorist side and added 20 more kills to his name, shattering the previous record in a competitive match. Still, his one-man show was not enough to push fnatic over the line as MIBR took control of proceedings in the final stages to force overtime, in which they would come out victorious without too much trouble.

fnatic did not let that setback get to them and enjoyed a promising start full of impetus, this time with Brollan as the main protagonist. The 17-year-old racked up 19 frags on the CT side as the Swedes kept their defense tight and compact, limiting MIBR to just five rounds in the half.

The Brazilians came out of the break a revitalised side and managed to bring the deficit to just one round at 11-12 after a strong start to the half. A comeback would not be on the cards, though, as a quad kill from Brollan put fnatic back in control and initiated a winning streak that culminated with victory for the Swedes.