Astralis and Liquid to ELEAGUE Premier grand finals
Astralis and Liquid have booked spots in the grand finals of ELEAGUE Premier 2018 with their wins over mousesports and Na`Vi, seeing Astralis look to keep the title of #1 team in the world as they head into the upcoming August player break.
Astralis kicked off the day with their semifinal bout against mousesports, securing a dominant 2-0 win (Nuke 16-11, Mirage 16-10). Despite the scorelines, Astralis seemed to be in firm control for the majority of the series as a dominant T side on Nuke and unstoppable CT side on Mirage allowed for a swift 2-0.
Nuke saw Astralis grab a quick 3-0 start on their T side off of a pistol round win, managing to further extend their lead to 8-3 after coming out victorious over a trade of gun rounds thanks to a 1vs3 clutch by Lukas "gla1ve" Rossander. Robin "ropz" Kool and Janusz "Snax" Pogorzelski aided mousesports in swinging back three additional rounds, but the Danes kept a strong 9-6 lead as they swapped to the CT side.
It wasn't until Astralis sat at a 13-6 lead after taking the second pistol round of the series that mousesports got a round on their T side. A comeback was attempted by the European side as five rounds went their way, but gla1ve once again shut down mousesports hopes by finding seven kills and winning a 1vs1 to take the final three rounds for his team.
Nicolai "dev1ce" Reedtz joined gla1ve in the fragfest on Mirage as Astralis put up a staunch defense, granting mousesports only three rounds as the Danes took it in turns to shut down the European side's site executes and post-plants.
It was in the final half of the series that mousesports finally found their first pistol round win, but an immediate reset by the hands of Astralis' deagles saw the Danes put themselves in touching distance of match point. Once again mousesports attempted a comeback as Snax shut down Astralis' B site hits to allow four rounds for his side before Astralis claimed 15 rounds, closing out the map not long after.
AstralisMOUZ| Astralis |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Lukas 'gla1ve' Rossander |
52 - 29 | +23 | 94.4 | 71.7% | 1.45 |
| Peter 'dupreeh' Rasmussen |
32 - 34 | -2 | 72.2 | 81.1% | 1.10 |
| Emil 'Magisk' Reif |
38 - 34 | +4 | 80.5 | 66.0% | 1.10 |
| Nicolai 'device' Reedtz |
32 - 31 | +1 | 68.9 | 66.0% | 1.04 |
| Andreas 'Xyp9x' Højsleth |
25 - 34 | -9 | 59.8 | 67.9% | 0.85 |
| MOUZ |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Robin 'ropz' Kool |
44 - 32 | +12 | 82.5 | 66.0% | 1.14 |
 Chris 'chrisJ' de Jong |
31 - 40 | -9 | 64.0 | 69.8% | 0.92 |
 Janusz 'Snax' Pogorzelski |
34 - 38 | -4 | 67.8 | 54.7% | 0.91 |
 Tomáš 'oskar' Šťastný |
28 - 36 | -8 | 59.9 | 60.4% | 0.80 |
 Miikka 'suNny' Kemppi |
25 - 33 | -8 | 60.7 | 58.5% | 0.77 |
Liquid were up next as they took on Aleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev's Na`Vi, seeing a close 16-13 win on Dust2 give way to a swift 16-9 victory for the North Americans on Na`Vi's map pick of Overpass. An especially impressive performance on Overpass and overall mental fortitude from Epitacio "TACO" de Melo saw the player drag the match over the line for his side after receiving devastating news about his father passing away earlier this morning.
Na`Vi kicked off Dust2 with a CT side pistol win, but Nick "nitr0" Cannella quickly replied back with three scout kills to help Liquid take a 3-1 lead. Na`Vi were able to regain the lead after s1mple got his side back into the match with a four-kill round with the AWP, but Liquid once again seized control with Jonathan "EliGE" Jablonowski coming to life to grant the CIS side only one more round in the half for a 10-5 scoreline.
Liquid were able to take the second pistol round for themselves, but Na`Vi gave Liquid a taste of their own medicine with a force-buy win to mount a comeback. Liquid were unable to get a read on Na`Vi as Danylo "Zeus" Teslenko outmaneuvered the North American side for eight of the nine ensuing rounds to once again take back the lead, but Liquid were able to edge out a win by taking four narrow round victories in a row for a 16-13 win.
Again Na`Vi took the opening pistol round to start their T side of Overpass, and this time were able to convert their win into a 3-0 lead despite extremely heavy losses to the ecoing side of Liquid. TACO and Keith "NAF" Markovic combined to take a trio of rounds back for Liquid once they had weapons on the board, and further helped to reset Na`Vi's economy after the CIS team snatched back one round in an attempt to regain the lead.
A stellar CT hold from Liquid granted them an additional five rounds in a row before Egor "flamie" Vasilyev was able to crack open defense with four frags and helped to grant Na`Vi a lifeline with the final two rounds of the half.
Na`Vi won their third pistol round of the series to give themselves some breathing room and a chance to get back into the series, but their hopes were dashed when Liquid fought back in the third round to pull the economy back into their favor. Another four round streak put Liquid in touching distance of match point before Na`Vi were able to reply once again, but a stunning 4k in a 2vs5 from TACO in the following round gave Liquid the opening they needed to close out the map 16-10.
Natus VincereLiquid| Natus Vincere |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Denis 'electroNic' Sharipov |
35 - 39 | -4 | 87.3 | 63.0% | 1.05 |
| Egor 'flamie' Vasilyev |
37 - 38 | -1 | 73.6 | 68.5% | 1.04 |
 Oleksandr 's1mple' Kostyliev |
37 - 38 | -1 | 79.5 | 66.7% | 1.01 |
| Danylo 'Zeus' Teslenko |
33 - 41 | -8 | 75.2 | 72.2% | 0.96 |
| Ioann 'Edward' Sukhariev |
30 - 40 | -10 | 60.6 | 64.8% | 0.83 |
| Liquid |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Keith 'NAF' Markovic |
45 - 34 | +11 | 88.9 | 77.8% | 1.34 |
 Nick 'nitr0' Cannella |
36 - 32 | +4 | 86.2 | 85.2% | 1.27 |
| Russel 'Twistzz' Van Dulken |
42 - 32 | +10 | 81.0 | 77.8% | 1.21 |
 Epitacio 'TACO' de Melo |
35 - 36 | -1 | 80.1 | 75.9% | 1.11 |
| Jonathan 'EliGE' Jablonowski |
37 - 38 | -1 | 70.4 | 70.4% | 1.01 |
Astralis and Liquid are set to lock horns in the grand finals of ELEAGUE Premier 2018 tomorrow as the two teams face off for the first place prize of $500,000 and the glory of finishing the season as ELEAGUE Premier champions. The match is set to kick off at 2 PM EDT as North America gets a chance to add a second ELEAGUE trophy to it's cabinet in 2018.
