Written by Vacant
Key Prematch odds:
- To win this series: BIG ( 84%) vs Envy (16%)
- BIG outright odds: 2/1
- ENVY outright odds: 33/1
- Read our group stage review for more details
A Rocky Road to the Next Round:
Coming into this game BIG were overwhelming favourites to win whilst Envy, who scraped through the group stage to get into the playoffs via the last chance bracket, were facing a very tough task to take anything away from this opening Upper Bracket series.
Despite this, Envy started off strongly and defied the odds to take a 1-0 lead in the series with a 16-13 win on their map pick Dust2. Buğra “Calyx” Arkın and Ismailcan “Xantares” Dörtkardeş led their respective teams scoreboards as expected, but it was the additional firepower on Envy of Michał “Michu” Müller and Thomas “Thomas” Utting, who came up with some hugely important frags that made the difference for Envy on this map.
BIG showed no signs of shellshock though and hit back straight away with a 16-10 victory on Mirage, and it was Florian “syrsoN” Rische who dominated for BIG in every metric as they picked up 10 rounds on T side and easily cut through Envy’s defence, holding off after an early scare in the second half to pick up the rounds they needed to close out the map.
In the end it was all down to Nuke. At halftime it was only 8-7 to BIG after a poor CT side considering how much Nuke tends to favour the defending team. However, despite a strong performance from Envy, BIG dug deep throughout a very nervy game and it took a crucial and very fortunate collateral kill clutch from syrsoN in the 28th round to bring BIG to match point and send them on their way to a 16-13 victory. It wasn’t the walkover they expected, but in the end they made it through to win the series 2-1 and booked their place in the second round of the upper bracket to face Virtus.Pro.
Key Stats:
Map 1 (Dust2)
- ENVY pulled off an eight round winning streak on their T side-
- While Buğra “Calyx” Arkın had the highest rating of 1.54, it was Michał “Michu” Müller who edged him out for the highest number of kills with 28 to Calyx’s 27
Map 2 (Mirage)
- Florian “syrsoN” Rische was on fire with 28 kills, including 17 in the first half , and a 1.84 rating
- He carved open Envy time and again with six opening kills and 20 AWP kills in total
Map 3 (Nuke)
- BIG won three out of four eco rounds against a fully bought Envy
- Calyx may have had the most kills with 29, but it was the combination of Ismailcan “Xantares” Dörtkardeş and Florian “syrsoN” Rische who dominated the server with the highest ratings of the game with 1.48 and 1.46 each
Vacant's Analysis:
- BIG: Mirage is where BIG excel with their meticulously drilled T-side plays, so it’s no surprise they were in control all the way on their home map. They showed their pedigree and experience to hold off a very determined Envy team, particularly on Nuke where they won three crucial half-buy rounds against a fully equipped Envy team, but they will have to step up their game if they are to live up to expectations and win the tournament.
- Envy: Their map pick in this series, Dust2, is one of those maps that provides the conditions for an upset with its wide open spaces making it difficult to lock down and very dependent on aim duels. With three of their players in good form to take these duels they were able to pull off the upset in the first map. They came close on Nuke too, and can count themselves unfortunate in the end not to have pulled off the upset with the performance they put in.
Next Up:
BIG will face Virtus.Pro in the next round of the upper bracket, whilst Envy will face MAD Lions in the lower bracket. Both games will take place on Wednesday 2nd December and before that there are two more exciting games: Fnatic vs Dignitas and OG vs MiBR to look forward to, so get your bets in on
Midnite.com.
Look out for our upcoming reports on Tuesday’s round of Upper Bracket R1 games Fnatic vs Dignitas, and OG vs MiBR
vacant
2020-11-30 10:18:54