fnatic and ENCE secure IEM Katowice berths

In two series that featured overtime maps and plenty of nail-baiting Counter-Strike, fnatic and ENCE emerged victorious.

Two more teams were added to the IEM Katowice team list with these results, fnatic taking down BIG 2-1 and ENCE achieving the same score over GODSENT. Both series were tightly fought affairs up until the final map, where the two losing teams went out with something of a whimper.

The A stream was host to BIG taking on fnatic, a grudge match that featured Owen "⁠smooya⁠" Butterfield battling against his old teammates; the last time this matchup occurred, fnatic triumphed to take the DreamHack November trophy. This time, it was a spot in the Katowice main event on the line.

The series began on Ancient and it was a wild fight between the two teams, with fnatic approaching the T side on their map pick with incredible pace, but BIG were clinching the majority of the rounds. Multiple clutches went against fnatic, who otherwise might have managed to make the half close, but ultimately Nils "⁠k1to⁠" Gruhne's stellar performance for his side was enough to secure a 12-3 half.

You might be forgiven for thinking the map would be over after such a convincing half, but Ancient is notoriously CT sided, and fnatic won their CT pistol to give themselves hope. In fact, the Anglo-Swedish side won the first 9 rounds of their CT half in a row to run it all the way back to 12-12, with BIG scrambling together a few rounds towards the end of the half to ensure they clinched a 15-15 score, and thus overtime.

fnatic took the advantage of starting OT on the CT side and grabbed a 3-0 first half, meaning they only needed to squeeze a single round out of their attack, which they did manage to clinch an incredibly tight map 19-17.

On BIG's pick of Vertigo they also opened on the T side, and they ran themselves out to a quick 7-0 lead with little resistance from fnatic. Eventually the boys in black and orange did wake up, but it was too late as they only managed to grab five rounds; BIG had their effective B executes to thank for continuing to find success later in the half.

Much like with the first map, the second half was a completely different story as BIG went completely cold, struggling to prevent the well-coordinated fnatic B hits as they moved onto the offense. fnatic also started to frag out individually, finding opening after opening as they bullied the German defence with apparent ease. BIG managed to recover just as it seemed fnatic might take the series 2-0, with Florian "⁠syrsoN⁠" Rische in particular waking up, to close the game out 16-13 and earn the decider of Overpass.

BIG will ultimately be disappointed that they weren't competitive in the decider, but fnatic's CT side on Overpass was simply too powerful for the Germans who watched the game slowly slip out of their hands. Even when they did get themselves into a 3v1 situation with the bomb down on A, Freddy "⁠KRIMZ⁠" Johansson came through with a stellar clutch to crush their dreams; the half finished 13-2 in fnatic's favour.

BIG never really got going, padding the score out with a few rounds in the second half but eventually losing 8-16, thus losing the series 1-2 and exiting IEM Katowice.

Over on the B stream ENCE took on GODSENT, also with a spot at the main event on the line.

The first map was a stomping as ENCE completely outclassed GODSENT on Nuke, picking up 11 T side rounds to make the second half a formality. They closed the map out quickly 16-5, with the entire squad posting solid statistics as they ran riot.

The Brazilians were far more comfortable on their own pick of Ancient, getting off to a great start by winning the force-buy after losing their T-side pistol to get out to a 3-1 lead. A close game ensued, but importantly the Brazilians kept putting T rounds on the board, eventually squeezing out an 8-7 lead going into the second half; Bruno "⁠b4rtiN⁠" Câmara was incredibly important in finding openers for his side.

Moving onto the second half it seemed GODSENT might take us quickly to a third map, as after ENCE won the pistol and converted the Brazilians went on a streak of five rounds in a row, and they looked like they would ride the favoured CT side all the way home; this was not the case as ENCE found enough on their offense to get to overtime.

In the end the Brazilians simply outlasted their counterparts, as after settling the first OT 3-3 they took the second convincingly 4-1, and thus took the series to the decider of Mirage.

Mirage began in close fashion, with the Brazilians starting on the CT side and trading rounds back and forth with ENCE, both teams struggling to put a big streak together; Lotan "⁠Spinx⁠" Giladi put together a stellar 1v3 clutch to keep the half close at a key juncture, doing enough to earn his team a 7-8 half.

Unfortunately, outside the pistol and conversion, GODSENT were unable to gain any traction on their T side, losing nine rounds on the trot with no bomb plant to lose the game 16-11. It was an anti-climax in a series that had been so entertaining on Ancient and in the first half of this map.