Cloud9 eliminate G2 from BLAST Showdown

They will face BIG for a spot in the Royal Arena.

Cloud9 are one win away from the BLAST Fall Final after defeating G2 2-1. The squad has been under pressure after a disappointing ESL Pro League, and have switched IGLs to Abay "⁠HObbit⁠" Khassenov for this event with the hope of kick-starting their project.

"electroNic wants to go back to the beast, the old electroNic," Ilya "⁠Perfecto⁠" Zalutskiy told James "⁠BanKs⁠" Banks after the match. The new style of calling was effective as Cloud9 racked up a 24-10 record on their T side over the best of three.

"On Anubis we didn't have a great idea of where they were, and we got surprised a lot on CT side," Justin "⁠jks⁠" Savage said in his elimination interview on stream. "On Ancient, we messed up a few rounds as well. We were getting a bit tense and they ran away with it."

G2's last CS:GO event was a disappointing one, rarely hitting the individual peaks they are known for. Nikola "⁠NiKo⁠" Kovač in particular had a poor event by his standards with a 0.98 rating and had been critical of the event not being played on CS2 beforehand.

Cloud9 picked Anubis, and the Russian squad had Sergey "⁠Ax1Le⁠" Rykhtorov to thank for keeping them in the game early on. The Russian rifler closed out three 1vsX situations after G2 weren't able to capitalize on their early-round advantages. Cloud9 went up a notch on their T side and found ten straight rounds to close out the first map of the series, 16-9.

Inferno began with a back-and-forth between the two sides but the imperious G2 offense grinded its way to a 10-5 lead at the half. A 1v4 from Perfecto in the second pistol helped Cloud9 to an 11-11 scoreline but at that point G2 took back control, eventually closing the map out after Nemanja "⁠huNter-⁠" Kovač found two kills on a hero M4.

On Ancient Cloud9 finally withstood the G2 offense and limited Rasmus "⁠HooXi⁠" Nielsen's men to just five rounds. HObbit was strong in mid, the new captain showing some individual form with a crucial 4K early in the first half.

G2 only won four more after the break, three requiring defusals, and once again fell foul of Cloud9 in the clutch as Ax1Le sprayed down three in a flashy 1v4 clutch on the A bomb-site.

The series showed a good blueprint for Cloud9, who were able to rely on star duo Dmitry "⁠sh1ro⁠" Sokolov and Ax1Le and individually overpowered G2 in the clutches.