The biggest stories and plays from day three of BLAST.tv Paris Major Legends Stage

Enjoy an easy-to-digest recap for the third day of play at the BLAST.tv Paris Major Legends Stage.

Heavyweights in ENCE and G2 bow out

After a mostly upset-less day two, the third day of play was a complete turnaround. ENCE, who were sent down to the 1-2 pool in Paris after a shock defeat to Into the Breach, were sent packing early on in the day following a resounding 0-2 loss to a well-playing Ninjas in Pyjamas.

The Nordic mix were in control for much of the fixture, handing the Marco "⁠Snappi⁠" Pfeiffer-led squad a 16-7 hounding on Mirage before wrapping things up with a 16-10 scoreline on Ancient to force the European roster to exit the Major in 12-14th place despite a flawless 3-0 run in the Challengers Stage.

Another big-name squad to be sent packing by the end of day three was G2, who were looking to bounce back after an 0-2 start by the inaugural day of the Legends Stage. The team around Rasmus "⁠HooXi⁠" Nielsen locked horns with fnatic in a hard-fought three-map bout, with Justin "⁠jks⁠" Savage's heroic 1.30-rated performance being unable to carry his team over the line in a marathon series that went the way of the black-and-orange (Inferno 16-19, Ancient 16-11, Vertigo 16-13).

The loss also brought an end to Nikola "⁠NiKo⁠" Kovač's dreams of finally lifting a CS:GO Major, one he came close to getting his hands on, on two separate occasions as he made the grand final of the ELEAGUE Boston and PGL Stockholm Majors in 2018 and 2021.

Monte, Liquid, and GamerLegion earn playoff berths

It wasn't all doom and gloom at the Major in Paris today, however, as a number of teams secured their own places on stage in front of the Accor Arena. Chief among them is Monte, who managed to take down their countrymen in Natus Vincere in order to progress further at the Major.

It was a matchup with a number of storylines, with Volodymyr "⁠Woro2k⁠" Veletniuk finally fulfilling the promise he made to Oleksandr "⁠s1mple⁠" Kostyliev in a spat that made its way to Twitter after a charity match last year. Viktor "⁠sdy⁠" Orudzhev also had something to smile about, besting his former team in a playoff-deciding game to secure a playoff berth, with his ex-teammates now set to fight against FaZe for a chance to join the Ukrainian on stage.

Liquid were the next team to punch their ticket to the Accor Arena following a 2-0 victory over the Brits of Into the Breach, earning their first playoff appearance at a Major since their quarter-final showing at the StarLadder Berlin Major in 2019. A shaky Overpass (19-17) allowed the Thomas "⁠Thomas⁠" Utting-led ensemble to have a fighting chance, but from there it was all the Josh "⁠oSee⁠" Ohm show, whose aggressive AWPing was quite the delight and ensured his team nabbed Anubis (16-9) and the series (2-0).

GamerLegion helped Justinas "⁠jL⁠" Lekavicius put a sock in it after he said in a pre-game interview on stream that he was confident Apeks "have [the victory] in the bag." The team around Kamil "⁠siuhy⁠" Szkaradek were zoned in all game long, ravaging their European counterparts on Ancient (16-7) before closing things out with another comfortable showing on Overpass (16-10) to make the playoffs in France.

FaZe one win away from playoff-qualifying recovery

FaZe's recovery is gaining steam as they live to fight another day in France. The European combine duked it out with Bad News Eagles — the team that eliminated Finn "⁠karrigan⁠" Andersen's men from the IEM Rio Major — in a must-win best-of-three to stay alive, and that's exactly what happened.

The PGL Antwerp Major champions were giving an eye-opening loss on their Overpass, as the Kosovar roster ran riot with an aggressive CT-side to march to a 16-3 victory. From there, however, it was FaZe who had the last laugh; the squad equalized on Mirage in overtime (19-17) before narrowly closing the series and eliminating the organization-less lineup following a 30-round duel on Inferno (16-14) to be a win away from making the playoffs.

Standings after day 3

Day four matchups

2-2 pool - winner earns spot in playoffs, loser is eliminated

Date	Matches
BLAST.tv Paris Major 2023
16/05/2023	FaZe 11:30 Natus Vincere	Match
16/05/2023	fnatic 15:45 Into the Breach	Match
16/05/2023	Apeks 19:30 Ninjas in Pyjamas	Match

Player of the day

A few players had their standout moments on the third day of competition, namely oSee, who is continuing to have his best LAN appearance in a Liquid jersey and sdy, who came alive versus his former team to earn Monte a place in the playoffs.

Robin "⁠ropz⁠" Kool takes the cake today, though, with his performances on Mirage (30-22) and Inferno (24-13) — map two and three — versus Bad News Eagles being enough to carry his team over the line and avoid an early exit from the Major.

The Estonian was a key reason why FaZe are still fighting in Paris and ended the best-of-three slugfest with a 1.31 rating, significantly higher than Helvijs "⁠broky⁠" Saukants' 1.13-rated performance, FaZe's second-best player.

Highlights of the day

HLTV coverage

The full photo gallery from day three of the Paris Major Legends Stage, captured by Josip "brcho" Brtan and Radosław "MAKKU" Makuch, can be found below:

Legends Stage day 3 photo gallery

Our writers on the ground, Lucas "LucasAM" Aznar Miles, Danish "Nohte" Allana, and Harry "NER0" Richards conducted the following interviews during the day:

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Woro2k: "First we need to believe and after that you can do everything"

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karrigan: "Beating Bad News Eagles now is slaying our demons"

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NiKo: "I did not deserve to win a Major in CS:GO"