ESL One Cologne EU – Groups Day 3 Review

The third day of the European ESL One Cologne 2020 bracket has come to an end. BIG have been sent out in joint last place alongside Team Heretics. For the team that has occupied the #1 spot in the HLTV rankings until now, this comes as a shocking blow.

NIP 2-1 BIG

The bad luck streak continues for the Germans. After failing in their domestic matchup with Sprout, they have now been sent home by the Ninjas in Pyjamas. And that’s despite an incredibly strong start on Vertigo!

The team got off to an 11-0 lead on the CT side. Even though NiP managed to pull a few rounds back, BIG quickly got away with a 16-5 victory. With Florian “syrsoN” Rische and Nils “k1to” Gruhne posting incredible numbers, the team looked absolutely sharp going into map #2.

Again, they started off strong with an early lead. Ending the half on 9-6 (on the T side, of all) should have given them more than enough leeway to get the victory. Instead, Tim “nawwk” Jonasson and Fredrik “REZ” Sterner stepped up their game so much that NiP eventually arrived at overtime. There, the two teams played a grueling 24 more rounds to decide the winner. Unfortunately for BIG, it was not them. The Ninjas managed to secure a 28-26 victory.

On Mirage, BIG’s spirits were broken. Hampus, posting a 1.70 rating, chimed in with a 1v2 clutch and led the NiP offense to victory.



FNATIC 2-1 HERETICS

The fnatic players took quite some time to arrive at this event mentally. Being crushed by Astralis, they hoped for redemption against Team Heretics. Unfortunately, Fabien “kioShiMa” and his crew were quick to deliver a 16-8 win on Nuke. One map separated fnatic from going out in last place. Maybe this finally brought the players back to life, as they went on to dominate Team Heretics on the following two maps. Ludvig “Brollan” Brolin and Freddy “KRIMZ” Johansson teamed up to demolish the Heretics’ Inferno defense. On Mirage, even the quieter Maikil “Golden” Selim managed to impress with 24 kills and a 1.64 rating.

Tomorrow, we will see MAD Lions and mousesports fight for their tournament lives in the Group A Elimination Match. On the other side of the bracket, MIBR will hope to survive against FaZe Clan. One of them will have to depart from ESL One Cologne soon. The day promises to be exciting and we will certainly see at least one top team out of the tournament.