Vitality take down BIG to set up clash against Astralis in DH Open Fall

The French squad was in control of the series throughout Dust2 and Inferno, securing at worst a top-3 finish in the Regional Major Ranking event.

The match between the fourth and seventh-best teams in the world did not provide as much excitement as was expected thanks to strong performances from all five Vitality members, with the Frenchmen securing a confident 2-0 win over BIG.

Vitality continued their winning streak on Dust2, now reaching five consecutive map wins, and shrugged off BIG on Inferno after a near-perfect start to the offensive side to claim the series. BIG will have a chance to redeem themselves in the lower bracket of DreamHack Open Fall, where they will face the winner of HEROIC - Sprout, while Vitality go on to face Astralis for a grand final spot on Friday, and could prove to be a difficult challenge for the team currently ranked #1.

With both teams having strong records on Dust2, 82% win rate for BIG and 73% for Vitality, the initial map was a toss-up on paper. After picking it, the German side did start 3-0 up on it as Terrorists, but Cédric "⁠RpK⁠" Guipouy set up his team for a good CT half with an opening double in the first rifle round. Vitality brought out the double AWP on Mathieu "⁠ZywOo⁠" Herbaut and Richard "⁠shox⁠" Papillon, and went up 7-4 before Nils "⁠k1to⁠" Gruhne's 4K with the Deagle allowed BIG to recover.

From an 8-7 half, Johannes "⁠tabseN⁠" Wodarz's team equalized things with a pistol win, but lost the following force to Vitality's B push. The French team then took the reins of the match, reaching 14 rounds after RpK's eco ace, and closed out the map 16-11.

ZywOo's pistol quad-kill foreshadowed a great map from the wunderkind on Inferno, as he was sitting on a 16K-1D scoreline with Vitality 9-2 ahead as Terrorists. BIG stopped the bleeding there, locking down an A play to start their comeback to a 9-6 half scoreline.

That good work was canceled out by Vitality in the second half, as Dan "⁠apEX⁠" Madesclaire's men looked comfortable marching towards match point, but were stopped at a bit earlier, at 14, thanks to BIG's eco victory and a 3v5 turnaround (14-9). The Germans managed to reach 11 rounds before Vitality tied it all up, with a shox - RpK B lockdown and ZywOo's double kill that made it 16-11.