FURIA send MOUZ home at Elisa Masters Espoo

The highest-ranked team in the tournament suffered a group-stage exit.

FURIA have secured a playoff spot at Elisa Masters Espoo after getting the better of MOUZ in a two-map series (Mirage 13-11, Ancient 13-7).

Kaike "⁠KSCERATO⁠" Cerato joined James "⁠BanKs⁠" Banks for a quick post-match interview, where he outlined the reasons why his team is so strong on Ancient. "We can push a lot on Ancient and be aggressive. Also, we can play a lot of mid-rounds, which we can do because we have FalleN as a mid-caller."

Gabriel "⁠FalleN⁠" Toledo also gave his thoughts about his new role on the desk. "It's a new experience for me, I have been calling for at least 10 years," he said. "It's about what's best for the team. The way we are trying out this experiment is giving us a good idea of what can happen in the future."

The Brazilians will meet the underdog story of the tournament, HAVU, in the semi-finals on Saturday, with the game set to start at 18:00 .

Date	Matches
Elisa Masters Espoo 2023
02/12/2023	HAVU 18:00 FURIA	Match

For MOUZ, this is a disappointing end to a tournament they were favored to win. An overtime loss to Apeks sent them down to the elimination match against Complexity, where they narrowly prevailed, but the team failed to show up against FURIA and suffered a shock group-stage exit.

MOUZ bit the bullet and played it safe by banning Anubis, the permaban of both teams, meaning FURIA could remove Inferno, a struggle map for the Brazilians in recent times.

MOUZ went for Mirage due to their veto disadvantage and failed to get going on the offensive side. FURIA won the pistol and ran away with a 4-0 lead before MOUZ got on the board, but the European combine failed to string rounds together. That led to FURIA taking a commanding 9-3 lead at the switch, which gave them a solid platform for victory.

Jimi "⁠Jimpphat⁠" Salo stuck a defuse in the pistol round to give his team a chance, and the Kamil "⁠siuhy⁠" Szkaradek-led team was able to come back to 10-11, but FURIA's relentless attacks on the A site eventually bore enough fruit for them to secure a hard-fought 13-11 victory.

MOUZ got an early 2-0 lead on Ancient but were quickly reeled in by FURIA, who showed dominant form on the offensive side. KSCERATO was great throughout the half and even stalled out a 1vs3 situation that pulled his team even further ahead. A second-half pistol victory gave MOUZ a lifeline after a 3-9 half, but their comeback attempt was stopped as soon as FURIA got to a full buy, and the Brazilians put together a four-round streak to secure a 13-7 victory and book their place in the playoffs.