NAVI qualify for Major, fnatic eliminated

NAVI was able to best Vitality and secure their spot at the Major, where they will be looking to defend their crown.

The third day of action is now well underway, with Natus Vincere beating Vitality to secure their qualification and Eternal Fire getting the better of fnatic, which means that the storied organization is now out of the running for another Major appearance.

For Vitality this isn't the end of the road, however, as they will have another chance on the final day of the action, facing one of the 2-2 pool teams.

The derby of the round between Natus Vincere and Vitality started off on Inferno. After winning the pistol round and getting to a 3-0 lead, the Dan "⁠apEX⁠" Madesclaire led team struggled for the remainder of the Terrorist side, as they won only three gun rounds throughout the half.

A double kill from Valeriy "⁠b1t⁠" Vakhovskiy in the second pistol round gave his team a 10-6 lead, and even though Vitality fought back with their force buy round win and tighten the score to 8-10, Kirill "⁠Boombl4⁠" Mikhailov's carry performance was too much for to much to handle as the map finished 16-13 in favor of Natus Vincere.

Mirage started according to expectations, considering Vitality have a 0% win rate on the map in 2022. Natus Vincere got up to a 7-0 lead on the back of Oleksandr "⁠s1mple⁠" Kostyliev's 1v3 clutch round, which included two no-scope kills, before Vitality were able to get their names on the scoreline. But once the French-Danish side got their first round, they looked comfortable on their CT side, winning all seven of the remaining rounds and winning the half 8-7.

The teams traded rounds throughout the second half, with Vitality showing us a much better Mirage than we were used to so far. Once the scores were tied at 13-13, it was Denis "⁠electroNic⁠" Sharipov finally waking up, killing four Vitality members on their A execute. In the end Natus Vincere prevailed 16-13, with Oleksandr "⁠s1mple⁠" Kostyliev leading the way with 34 kills.

s1mple and company have a chance to earn one of the last two Legends spots on offer in the A group, either automatically if they end up as the highest-seeded team from the 3-1 pool, or via a tiebreaker.

In the elimination game, we had Eternal Fire picking Dust2 and quickly proving why they feel comfortable on the map, as they were able to win the less favored Terrorist half 8-7. Once they switched sides, fnatic were powerless and quickly found themselves at a 14-7 deficit, which simply proved too much to overcome, despite Freddy "⁠KRIMZ⁠" Johansson's star performance featuring 29 kills, 11 more than any of his teammates.

The next map of the series was Inferno, the pick of fnatic. Ismailcan "⁠XANTARES⁠" Dörtkardeş and his boys once again started strong, getting up to a 7-1 lead before fnatic were able to get back into the game on the back of an eco round win. They started to claw back at their deficit, losing just one round in the half which finished 8-7 in favor of Eternal Fire. The Turkish team was able to win the second pistol round, but after that struggled to break down fnatic's defense. The scores were quickly tied up at 11-11, with Freddy "⁠KRIMZ⁠" Johansson once again putting up decent numbers on the defense, enabling his team to close out the map 16-12.

Overpass was the deciding map, where fnatic were just about able to win the CT half 8-7 on the back of a good finish, winning five out of the last six rounds. Eternal Fire won the second pistol round, but soon their streak stopped after the 1v1 clutch between Valentin "⁠poizon⁠" Vasilev and Özgür "⁠woxic⁠" Eker, where it was the Bulgarian who managed to get the round for his team after a miss play by his opponent.

Following that round the map looked to be in fnatic's hands, as they won the next four rounds without much difficulty. The Turkish team fought back however, with an Yasin "⁠xfl0ud⁠" Koç clutch giving them a morale boost that enabled them to tie up the scores at 13-13. The next three rounds were comfortable for Eternal Fire, as they closed out the map 16-13 and kept themselves in the running for a Major appearance.