MIBR knock Complexity down to BLAST Premier Spring Showdown

The Brazilians live to fight another day, with Vitality their next rival in the bracket.

MIBR survive the first round of the BLAST Premier Spring Groups Knockout Stage with a 2-0 victory over Complexity, continuing to beat expectations and knocking the squad led by Johnny "⁠JT⁠" Theodosiou down to the Showdown.

There were no doubts early on in the veto as Complexity banned Dust2, the only map MIBR were able to win in the opening round of best-of-one matches — albeit against none other than Natus Vincere —, but that was no problem for the Brazilians as they got the best of their North American counterparts on Nuke and Ancient.

Falling to MIBR is a tough hit for Complexity and puts a large question mark on how competitive the Americans are going to be early on in the year as their first BO1 losses to G2 and BIG have now given way to a BO3 loss to the tournament’s outsiders, who are at the event with a stand-in.

Complexity’s woes started early on in the series as they fell to a 1-8 deficit on the attacking side of Nuke before a push late in the half brought it back to a 5-10.

The North Americans tried to put on a comeback on the CT side, with Ricky "⁠floppy⁠" Kemery and Paytyn "⁠junior⁠" Johnson leading the way, but enough close rounds went the way of the Brazilians, including a crucial 1vs2 by Jhonatan "⁠JOTA⁠" Willian, which ended with MIBR winning 16-13 and going up 1-0 before jumping into their map pick.

Ancient was another nail-biter in an all-around competitive match, with Complexity taking a 9-6 lead on the CT side. This time around it was Justin "⁠FaNg⁠" Coakley who tried to step up and kick things into gear for his team as MIBR, with Raphael "⁠exit⁠" Lacerda at the helm, fought to stay in it on the defense.

The Brazilians got more and more comfortable as the second half progressed, finally going all the way to map point in the thirtieth round, which they won in a tight situation on the A site to close out the series.

MIBR will now face Vitality on Friday, February 4, at 13:00 , with the winner going on to the final round of the knockout stage and the loser placed in one of the last chance stage spots. "They have three legends on the team," exit said of the French-Danish squad they will now face, "they're a very strong team and we'll be prepared for them."