Gambit send Liquid to BLAST lower bracket

After two tightly contested maps, Liquid collapsed on the decider.

Gambit secured their spot in the upper bracket final with a solid 2-1 series victory over Liquid, losing Vertigo 13-16 but taking home Inferno 16-14 and Overpass 16-2. It had been a very close series between the two sides up until the final map, where Liquid fell apart, despite Overpass being statistically their best map throughout the year.

Inferno was the first map of the series, the pick of Liquid, and fans were treated to a back-and-forth affair.

Liquid kicked things off on the T side with a pistol and conversion to a 4-0 lead, before Gambit found their feet and put up some rounds of their own. In general in this half it was the slower rounds that found more success for Liquid, as they were able to squeeze the passive defence of the Russian squad; in the end Liquid did just enough to secure an 8-7 lead.

The second half was largely all Gambit, who had Vladislav "⁠nafany⁠" Gorshkov in particular to thank for finding space and entry frags to crack open bombsites for his team. Towards the end of the half Liquid managed to find the rounds needed to keep things close, but eventually Gambit sealed the deal and took the map 16-14. Abay "⁠HObbit⁠" Khassenov was the standout player on the server with a 1.44 rating.

The series moved to Gambit's pick of Vertigo, and this time it was the Russian squad who started on the T side. They got off to the perfect start with a pistol win but needed a 2v5 from nafany and Dmitry "⁠sh1ro⁠" Sokolov to take the follow-up, before losing the third to an eco. The rest of the half proceeded in similar fashion, with messy rounds being traded between the teams before Gambit put together a streak of four to end the half with a slim 8-7 lead.

The second half was much of the same, rounds being traded with neither team able to put together a convincing streak or take control of the game. In the end it was the fact that Liquid started off the half 3-0 with a pistol win, and that Gambit couldn't retake a bombsite to save their lives, that secured a 16-13 victory for the NA side.

On to the decider, Overpass, and this was far from the close battles of Inferno and Vertigo. Liquid simply didn't arrive back on the server for the final map, getting battered 12-3 in the first half, their defaults either not getting enough map control to make an execute potent, or being picked apart by Sergey "⁠Ax1Le⁠" Rykhtorov and sh1ro towards A.

No resistance was found in the second half, with Gambit ending the map 16-2 and thus the series.