G2 outlast Heroic to progress to ESL One Cologne playoffs

G2 took down HEROIC after a keenly-contested third map to lock down their spot in the ESL One Cologne playoffs.

G2 and HEROIC squared off in Group B’s upper bracket semi-final after confidently dispatching of their first-round opponents, MIBR and FaZe. The two teams won their own map picks with dominant 16-7 scorelines before a highly-contested Mirage determined the victor. The back-and-forth matchup pushed the decider to overtime, where G2 edged the series over the line to send HEROIC to the lower bracket.

HEROIC set off at a blistering pace on their map pick of Nuke, storming to an 8-0 score on the offensive side with multi-kill rounds from Nikolaj "⁠niko⁠" Kristensen and René "⁠TeSeS⁠" Madsen leading the charge. The half looked on course for a gloomy end, but G2 tightened up their CT setups to find the necessary frags to get themselves back into the match. A string of rounds went in favour of the French-Serbian squad to reduce the score difference to four at the midway point, with Audric "⁠JACKZ⁠" Jug and Nemanja "⁠nexa⁠" Isaković coming alive to post over 100 ADR each.

A successful retake on the B site and dominance in the subsequent rounds put the Danes firmly in the driver’s seat as Casper "⁠cadiaN⁠" Møller’s troops rapidly approached map point. G2 managed to momentarily deny the conclusion of Nuke with a team ace to lock down their first round of the half, but TeSeS stepped up to the plate in the following round with a 1v1 clutch to cap off a fantastic 1.67-rated performance and commandingly claim a 16-7 victory.

Now on their choice of Vertigo, it was G2’s turn to exhibit the damage they could inflict on a well-drilled offence, and they did just that with an on-point nexa spearheading the T side by calling the shots and clicking the enemies’ heads. The G2 in-game leader helped his team accrue nine rounds with a 21-8 KDD, with HEROIC finding three sporadic rounds before securing three-straight to close out the half chasing a 6-9 deficit.

nexa’s importance didn’t end there as the Serbian hit four crisp headshots in the second half pistol to secure double digits for his team. Kenny "⁠kennyS⁠" Schrub and JACKZ also delivered their fair share of kills in the latter stages of Vertigo to tie up the series with a 16-7 map win and force a decider.

Mirage played host to the decider, where HEROIC kicked off proceedings with a quick double for an early lead. The two teams then locked horns in a back and forth which prevented both sides from gaining any substantial advantage. The Danes finally looked as if they were heading towards a comfortable ending to the half off the back of a watertight A site defence, but a fast-paced B site hit with just upgraded pistols in hand yielded G2 two additional rounds to narrow the score difference to just one at the break.

The close nature of the map continued into the second half, and kennyS and cadiaN wreaked havoc with their AWPs to post numerous rounds for their respective teams. Levelled at 10-10, Martin "⁠stavn⁠" Lund recorded a triple kill which kick-started a small period of success for HEROIC, who went on to secure a 13-10 lead. The Danes soon hit series point, but G2 were not down and out just yet as the French-Serbian squad turned it up a gear to force overtime.

HEROIC and G2 once more traded rounds between each other in the early overtime rounds, but it was the nexa-led squad who emerged victorious after successive B site hits to win the map 19-17, and the series 2-1.