FORZE pile more misery on FURIA in Malta

A 13-0 thrashing on their own map pick laid bare the Brazilian team's issues.

FURIA have dropped down to the last-chance stage of ESL Pro League's Group C after a 2-0 thrashing at the hands of a FORZE team that travelld to Malta with a makeshift roster and barely had any practice for the tournament.

The Russian side looked composed throughout the series and showed such great team play that one would think they have been playing together for ages. But the team had "three or four practice days" leading up to the event, according to Aleksandr "⁠shalfey⁠" Marenov, and only picked up Owen "⁠smooya⁠" Butterfield and Aleksei "⁠NickelBack⁠" Trofimov because there were no other available options in the CIS region due to visa issues.

The way in which they were humbled — with a 13-0 rout on their map pick of Overpass — sets a new low for FURIA and raises questions about the direction of this team. According to Gabriel "⁠FalleN⁠" Toledo, Kayke "⁠kye⁠" Bertolucci could be playing with the team for next "month or two," but how many more blows can FURIA take this season and still stand?

The Brazilian team got off to a rough start on Nuke but still managed to post four rounds on the T side, with Kaike "⁠KSCERATO⁠" Cerato doing his best to keep the team in the game. After losing the ensuing pistol, FURIA put together a string of rounds to whittle the deficit down to three, but they were stopped in their tracks by multi-kill rounds from NickelBack and Andrey "⁠tN1R⁠" Tatarinovich.

FURIA's fans hoped for a better performance on Overpass, but the team got into their rhythm and planted the bomb only twice during the entire half. Two USP headshots from KSCERATO set FURIA up for a pistol round victory, but FORZE comfortably secured the A site and rubbed further salt into the Brazilian players' wounds, leaving them with much thinking to do before their last-chance game against Bad News Kangaroos on Friday.

"Everyone is pissed off here, too," FURIA co-owner posted on X after the match. "I understand the anger. My gratitude to those who love and suffer. I really appreciate [everything], even the criticism. It has never been easy. The defeat was fucking ugly. We will find good solutions, I'm sure of it."