Thanks to come-from-behind victories, Complexity Gaming and Natus Vincere clinched berths in the ESL Pro League Season 19 playoffs on Thursday in Saint Julian’s, Malta.
In the Group D upper-bracket semifinals, Complexity rallied for a 2-1 win over HEROIC, and Natus Vincere overtook BIG 2-1.
HEROIC opened with a 13-5 win on Nuke before Complexity captured Vertigo 13-11 and Anubis 13-7. Norway’s Hakon “hallzerk” Fjaerli paced Complexity with 54 kills and a plus-18 kill-death differential. Denmark’s Rene “TeSeS” Madsen logged 46 kills.
After BIG prevailed 13-9 on Anubis, Natus Vincere took Nuke 13-3 and Ancient 13-7. Ukraine’s Valeriy “b1t” Vakhovskiy amassed 47 kills and a plus-16 K-D differential. Florian “syrsoN” Rische finished with 43 kills and a plus-2 K-D differential for BIG’s all-German roster.
The $750,000 Counter-Strike: Global Offensive event began with 32 teams broken up into four groups of eight. Group-stage winners advance to the quarterfinals; runners-up advance to the Round of 12 as the high seeds; third-place teams advance to the Round of 16 as the high seeds; and fourth-place teams advance to the Round of 16 as the low seeds.
The group stage is triple-elimination with upper, middle and lower brackets. All matches are best-of-three until the grand final, which is best-of-five.
The tournament runs through May 12. The winner earns $170,000 and qualifies for the IEM Cologne 2024 event.
In other action on Thursday, ENCE swept Monte 2-0 and GamerLegion squeezed past FORZE Esports 2-1 in Group C mid-bracket quarterfinals.
ENCE rolled 13-3 on Nuke and 13-10 on Vertigo thanks to 37 kills and a plus-19 K-D differential from Poland’s Olek “hades” Miskiewicz. Ukrainians Volodymyr “Woro2k” Veletniuk and Sergiy “DemQQ” Demchenko each had 26 kills for Monte.
GamerLegion sandwiched a 13-3 triumph on Nuke and a 13-8 victory on Mirage around a 13-7 loss to FORZE on Ancient. Sebastian “volt” Malos topped GamerLegion with 43 kills and a plus-13 K-D differential. The United Kingdom’s Owen “smooya” Butterfield wound up with 42 kills and a plus-10 K-D differential for FORZE.
In the Group D mid-bracket first round, Pera Esports edged Ninjas in Pyjamas 2-1 and FlyQuest dumped BOSS 2-0.
After Pera took Anubis 13-5, Ninjas in Pyjamas bounced back for a 13-8 win on Vertigo. The decisive third map, Ancient, went to Pera 19-17 in double overtime. Russia’s Danil “Porya” Poryadin and Poland’s Brajan “DGL” Lemecha each had 62 kills for Pera, while Sweden’s Max “maxster” Jansson amassed 58 kills for Ninjas in Pyjamas.
The Friday schedule:
–Group C mid-bracket semifinal: ENCE vs. GamerLegion
–Group C lower-bracket quarterfinal: Bad News Kangaroos vs. FURIA Esports
–Group D mid-bracket quarterfinal: BIG vs. Pera Esports
–Group D mid-bracket quarterfinal: HEROIC vs. FlyQuest
–Group D lower-bracket quarterfinal: Ninjas in Pyjamas vs. BOSS
ESL Pro League Season 19 prize pool
1. $170,000, 2,000 BLAST Premier points — TBD
2. $80,000, 1,400 points — TBD
3-4. $45,000, 750 points — TBD
5-8. $32,000, 275 points — TBD
9-12. $23,500 — TBD
13-16. $17,500 — TBD
17-20. $12,000 — SAW, M80, two teams TBD
21-28. $7,000 — Fnatic, Eternal Fire, Team Falcons, TYLOO, four teams TBD
29-32. $3,500 — Imperial Esports, Sharks Esports, two teams TBD
–Field Level Media