Vitality spoil NAVI's six-man roster debut in BLAST World Final opener

The Ukrainian side were unable to muster a map win in their first outing with Andrii "⁠npl⁠" Kukharskyi.

Vitality have claimed victory in their opening match of the BLAST Premier World Final, defeating Natus Vincere 2-0 (19-16 Inferno, 16-11 Nuke). The European mixture came into the event with a chip on their shoulder after an early elimination from the IEM Rio Major, where they were sent packing in 12-14th place with a 1-3 record, and demonstrated much better form with an extra month of practice under their belts as they looked in control for much of the series.

NAVI, meanwhile, will have much to look back on after faltering in their six-man roster debut, bringing in npl for the series opener on Inferno before swapping him out for Viktor "⁠sdy⁠" Orudzhev on Nuke. The 17-year-old NAVI Junior member didn't particularly impress on the map as a whole, playing in pit on the CT-side and ending the map at the bottom of the scoreboard with a 0.80 rating.

More worrying for NAVI should be their performance on Nuke, where they fumbled a 6-0 start into losing the map 11-16. The team will need to demonstrate better form if they want to avoid an early elimination as they will next face HEROIC at 13:00 on Thursday, while Vitality will have the chance to advance directly to the semi-finals when they take on OG at 16:00 .

A snappy double kill from Oleksandr "⁠s1mple⁠" Kostyliev got things started on Inferno, the pair of frags helping Natus Vincere win the first pistol round of the series on the CT side. Vitality answered right back with a force-buy to immediately swing momentum into their favor, however, and went on to repeatedly abuse rotations in ensuing rounds to push up to a 5-2 scoreline. Just when it looked like the game could rapidly spiral out of control for NAVI, an XM1014 triple kill from s1mple gave them an opening to get back into the map, and further multi-kill rounds from Valeriy "⁠b1t⁠" Vakhovskiy allowed the Ukrainian team to climb back to a respectable 7-8 scoreline by the side swap.

An identical scenario unfolded at the start of the second half as NAVI's pistol victory was immediately responded to by Vitality, who further extended their lead to 11-8. NAVI finally cracked through the European composition's defenses following alternating bombsite hits, evening the score at 11-11, but were unable to take the lead as Vitality held on by halting back-to-back A site attacks.

s1mple and company then seemed to have found the winning formula as they won three rounds in a row, closing in on match point at 14-13, but a heroic quad kill defense of top middle from Emil "⁠Magisk⁠" Reif completely turned the tides and allowed Vitality to clinch 15 rounds first. Though NAVI battled back to force overtime, they were unable to overcome stellar fragging from Mathieu "⁠ZywOo⁠" Herbaut and Lotan "⁠Spinx⁠" Giladi, who helped their side close out the map 19-16.

A sneaky entry from s1mple enabled a swift pistol round victory for NAVI on Nuke, leaving Vitality saving in a 4vs5 situation. This time, NAVI converted their early pistol win into a streak of rounds, accelerating up to a 6-0 lead before double kills from Vitality's Danish duo got them on the board. NAVI immediately responded by putting up their seventh round, but their grip on the map began to slip with Vitality finding ways to lock down their defenses. Few kills went the way of the Ukrainian team in the rest of the half, and it was Vitality who came out slightly ahead at the break, 8-7.

Vitality further extended their seven-round spree from the end of the half into a streak of 13, ZywOo and Magisk shining in the pistol round by recovering a 2vs4 situation to keep their team in control.

Vitality kept their foot on the gas from that point on, pushing up to a 14-7 lead before closing out the map a few rounds later and sending NAVI down to the lower bracket.