BLAST Premier Fall Final: FaZe, NAVI, G2, Liquid win opening matches

The BLAST Premier Fall Final campaign for FaZe Clan, Heroic, Natus Vincere, and Team Liquid got off to a winning start.

The BLAST Premier Fall Final has begun, featuring eight of the best CS:GO teams in the globe competing for a whopping $425,000 prize pool. On the first day of the competition, some close matches featured spectacular aces and clutches from well-known players, including the Ukrainian superstar Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev, while other matches ended in lopsided victories.

FaZe Clan, Heroic, Natus Vincere, and Team Liquid have secured their first victory, forcing OG, Ninjas in Pyjamas, Team Fluxo, and G2 Esports to the brink of elimination in the process. Here are all of the results from the BLAST Premier Fall Final’s opening-day matches.

FaZe move one step closer to the playoffs

FaZe defeated OG 2-0 to start off their BLAST Premier Fall Final campaign in style. The North American team secured an easy victory on Ancient 16-3 before starting a 14-round streak on Mirage that ended with another easy 16-6 victory. The only bright spot on OG’s side was Russian AWper Abdul “degster” Gasanov, who had 33 kills and a 1.09, while the rest of the squad struggled against the ferocious FaZe Clan.

Meanwhile, Russel “⁠Twistzz⁠” Van Dulken was the standout performer for FaZe as he picked up 41 kills, a 1.59 overall rating, and numerous multi-kills over the course of the two maps. Twistzz discussed FaZe’s strategy for the game with Fragster in a conversation following the match.

Do you think that anyone can stop you now that you got this easy win?

Twistzz: It’s just the beginning of the event but It’s nice to start strong. OG wasn’t even expecting us to start that hot, it was just the first game. The event will, obviously, continue but we are confident.

The first map didn’t start off well, then all of a sudden, things went quite smoothly on the second map

We were just trying to find a rhythm in the T-side of Mirage and when we found what was working, we constantly adopted it to stay one step ahead of OG.

Heroic upset NIP 2-1 with an incredible comeback

After dropping seven consecutive rounds at Inferno, Ninjas in Pyjamas bounced back and established their dominance over Heroic thanks to an outstanding defense in the second half that made it difficult for Heroic to gain access to any bomb sites. Heroic, however, made a spectacular comeback, winning 12 T-side rounds on both Ancient and Overpass to turn a 0-1 deficit into a surprise 2-1 triumph. In the upper bracket final, Heroic will face FaZe for the semifinal seed, and Ninjas in Pyjamas and OG will clash for survival in the elimination match. Rasmus “sjuush” Beck stopped for a quick chat with Fragster after the match, giving his thoughts on the comeback victory.

How did you manage to dominate NIP two times in a row after dropping the first map?

Sjuush: We wanted to punish them for picking Inferno but it didn’t go well. Ancient and Overpass are two really strong maps for us so we were confident going into those. Even though we switched the side, it doesn’t matter that much to us because we were really confident in Casper’s (Casper “cadiaN” Møller) calls and we had the momentum.

NAVI crushed Fluxo 2-0 as s1mple pulls off a spectacular performance

Natus Vincere started off their BLAST Fall Final campaign on the right foot, destroying Fluxo on Dust2 and Mirage to progress to the upper bracket finals. When the Brazilian underdogs were up 12-10 on Dust II, the Ukrainian superstar Oleksandr “⁠s1mple⁠” Kostyliev eliminated all five members of Fluxo,  pulling off a stunning ace that electrified the CS:GO fans.

S1mple’s brilliance on the A bombsite was sufficient to harm Fluxo’s economy for the remainder of the game and shift the momentum in NAVI’s favor as they ended up winning the map 16-14. S1mple concluded the series with a whopping 48 kills and an impressive 1.35 rating HLTV rating. 

Liquid ruins G2’s opening game

As Jonathan “EliGE” Jablonowski and Mareks “YEKINDAR” Gainskis continue to excel for Liquid, the team is off to a great start at the BLAST Premier Fall Final. The North American team destroyed G2’s return to professional play by winning the first game, Vertigo, 16-10, and the close second map, Mirage, 16-14. Despite strong performances from Nikola “NiKo” Kovač and Ilya “m0NESY” Osipov, who finished with a combined total of 71 kills across the two maps, G2 was unable to build on their momentum and fell for the fourth time in a row since October. 

The European team is now on the verge of elimination as a result of this painful loss, and their only chance of surviving is a victory over Fluxo in the elimination game. Liquid, on the other hand, advances to the upper-bracket final, where they will face the Ukrainian CS:GO powerhouse. NAVI will try to avenge their loss at the IEM Rio Major, where Liquid dominated them in a best-of-one match. The winners of the upper bracket finals will move straight to the semi-finals, while the losers will start their playoff journey from the quarter-final. 

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