paiN outlast Sharks; march on in Stockholm

The lowest-ranked team of the event couldn't capitalize on six match points and ended up eliminated from the PGL Stockholm Major Challengers Stage.

In an all-Brazilian matchup between two teams tied with an 0-2 record, paiN came out on top after a long and messy BO3 series. Sharks edged out their pick Vertigo after a second-half comeback and overtime, while paiN did the same on Ancient where their opponents failed to capitalize on a 15-9 advantage. On the decider, Nuke, paiN looked miles ahead and swept their countrymen to stay alive in Stockholm.

paiN lost their two previous games at the event in close fashion, going down to 16-14 against both Virtus.pro and Renegades. After eliminating Sharks who previously fell to MOUZ and TYLOO, paiN have a chance to reach the top 16 of the Major — but need to win two more BO3s to do so.

A solid CT side for paiN got the team going on Vertigo, reaching a 12-6 lead shortly after the switch. An ineffective offensive half followed as Sharks' Romeu "⁠zevy⁠" Rocco destroyed them on the AWP. He picked up 31 kills as his team reached overtime and closed out their pick 19-16.

On Ancient, a notoriously CT-sided map, paiN earned six rounds on the offense, but losing a force buy early in the second half set up Sharks' relentless T-side. Jhonatan "⁠jnt⁠" Silva's team was 15-9 up but failed to capitalize on the six match points they had as the game descended into chao. Rafael "⁠saffee⁠" Costa and Rodrigo "⁠biguzera⁠" Bittencourt inspired an unexpected comeback and helped paiN stay alive with 22-20 final score on the map.

After two tightly contested maps, paiN ran over Sharks on Nuke. saffee picked off the encroaching Terrorists all across the map to establish an 11-4 CT side which paiN closed out with a flawless offense, 16-4.

This is how the results look after the second day of the Challengers Stage has been concluded: