Pro League Finals race wide open in Europe; MIBR, Renegades to fight for LAN spot in the Americas

16/5/2019 - 12:56

Day two of the second round of ESL Pro League is now behind us, with all four teams still in contention in Group A in Europe but just two in the Americas.

The second day of action in Leicester ended with a four-way tie in Group A as Wednesday's match winners both came up short, leaving all teams with a 1-1 record ahead of the final round of fixtures.

fnatic, who had been defeated by OpTic in a close three-map series on day one, picked up their first victory after taking down HellRaisers in another series that went the full the distance. A great individual display by Tomáš "⁠oskar⁠" Šťastný on Overpass helped the European mixture to cancel out fnatic's victory on Mirage, but the Swedes prevented the reverse sweep by winning Train with a near-flawless defense, with Simon "⁠twist⁠" Eliasson leading the charge on the decider map.

fnatic bounced back from the defeat to OpTic

OpTic looked to be in prime position to go 2-0 in the group after a dream start to the series against Aristocracy that saw them take a commanding 10-1 lead on Mirage. However, the Polish team performed a spectacular comeback to take the game to overtime, eventually locking down the map at 22-20.

Next up was Nuke, where, after taking a shaky 9-6 lead on the CT side, Aristocracy absolutely blew OpTic away in the second half. With Karol "⁠rallen⁠" Rodowicz and Jacek "⁠MINISE⁠" Jeziak putting in great effort, the ex-devils.one team ran all over the Danish defense and prevented their opponents from stringing rounds together or building up an economy, putting the game to bed at 16-11.

Group A

TEAM

Over in the Americas, the action started with a one-sided affair as Renegades made light work of Isurus. Justin "⁠jks⁠" Savage was in stunning form, averaging a 1.73 rating as he helped his team to dispatch the Argentinians, who could not even hit double digits on either map.

Renegades will take on MIBR for a spot at the LAN finals

The final match of the day was a three-map series between MIBR and Complexity, with the North American side dealing the first blow as they took Dust2 off the back of a strong individual display by Rory "⁠dephh⁠" Jackson (1.76 rating, 119.9 ADR). MIBR responded in kind with a 16-1 blowout on Overpass before scraping past their opponents on Mirage by a 16-13 scoreline.

Group A

TEAM

In Europe, the top two sides of the group will secure spots at the Pro League Finals, taking place in Montpellier from June 18-23, while in the Americas, only the group winner will qualify for the showpiece event.

Below you can find the schedule for the final day of ESL Pro League Round Two's Group A: