Sprout advance to ESL One Cologne playoffs after taking down OG

The German-Polish side secured another upset in ESL One Cologne 2020 to become the first European team to advance to the playoffs of the tournament.

"A successful outcome would probably be to win one match", Josef "⁠faveN⁠" Baumann said in an interview leading up to ESL One Cologne, a tournament Sprout (ranked #40) qualified for by winning the ESL Meisterschaft Spring. By first defeating BIG and now OG, the outsiders surpassed their expectations by far and earned a spot in the playoffs,

The upper-bracket semi-final of Group A saw Sprout take a comfortable win on Train before OG clawed back on Inferno, forcing the decider. On Nuke, OG were strung out to dry by Timo "⁠Spiidi⁠" Richter's T side, which earned Sprout the 2-1 victory. OG are still in competition, though, and will be playing MAD Lions for a playoff spot on Wednesday.

The key rounds on Train seemingly all came down to clutches. Aleksi "⁠Aleksib⁠" Virolainen bested Spiidi in a 1v1 on B in round 6 to keep OG from falling behind early as CTs (5-3), but momentum swung the way of the German-Polish side after Michał "⁠snatchie⁠" Rudzki outplayed Valdemar "⁠valde⁠" Bjørn Vangså on A. Sprout looked good for the rest of the half, with Spiidi's 1v3 pushing them to a 10-5 scoreline.

OG took the first two rounds after the switch before valde added a 1v3 of his own, but Sprout retaliated with a Scout-force to make it 11-9. faveN and co. didn't look back after that, closing out their map pick without any slipups, 16-9.

A 3-0 start on the T side of their map pick wasn't converted into an early lead for OG as Sprout looked good from the first rifle round when Spiidi and faveN locked down B. Aleksib's men continued focusing on the smaller bombsite throughout the half, but only found success after being 8-4 behind, mainly thanks to Issa "⁠ISSAA⁠" Murad's good form.

The European team pulled it back to 8-7 before the second half started, and got into the lead thanks to a second-round force-buy working out (11-9). However, snatchie's AWPing put a stop to OG's streak and Sprout built momentum, edging closer to victory at 13-11. OG then edged out three very close rounds, starting with a force buy hold of B, to stay alive and eventually close out Inferno, 16-13.

Sprout's slow and methodical T side on Nuke proved difficult for OG to deal with, as the European side was forced to save round after round as Denis "⁠denis⁠" Howell and co. broke into the sites successfully. In the few rounds that came close, snatchie stepped up to the task with the clutch, allowing his team to tie 13 rounds in a row and end the half dominantly. Starting the favorable side of the map 13-2 up meant that it was just a matter of time before Sprout brought it to a conclusion, 16-3, after faveN and Paweł "⁠dycha⁠" Dycha claimed the force buy.