BLAST Premier Spring Showdown 2024 began today and there was excitement in the air as s1mple was set to play his first ever official game of CS2.
Sadly, it ended in defeat for the Ukrainian thanks to a massive upset victory by Swedish team Metizport.
Let's examine how the game played out and the other BO3s from day one of the Showdown.
The opening game of the day was between Russian team Cloud9 and Asian/EU mix team Rare Atom.
Cloud9 got off to a strong start on their opponent's map pick; they took Mirage with a 13-5 scoreline. Although phzy fought admirably for Rare Atom, he was powerless to prevent Boombl4 and co. from securing an advantage in the series.
Anubis was far closer. A map that ended 13-11, phzy again starred for Rare Atom but Cloud9's impressive team performance saw them advance to the quarter-finals.
Although Vertigo started strong for Ninjas in Pyjamas (Young Ninjas?) with a confident T-side pistol round win, the game was very quickly turned on its head as kyxsan and his trusty Five SeveN secured an instant reply.
From there on out, Vertigo was a one-sided affair.
It ended 13-6, and the Heroic IGL continued strong to top frag with 20 kills.
Just like the first series of the day, map two was far closer. This time, playing on Mirage, Ninjas in Pyjamas managed to force overtime on their way to a 16-14 defeat.
maxster was strong with a 26-20 statline, but NertZ and nicoodoz combining for 57 kills were enough to push Heroic over the line.
The game of the day was Metizport vs Falcons. Not only was it a banger, but it also signified s1mple's return to Counter-Strike following his period of inactivity.
Falcons started the brightest. They won Metizport's map pick of Mirage with a 13-9 scoreline. A strong map from Falcons duo SunPayus and Magisk, they combined for 42 kills to get the win.
However, momentum quickly shifted in Metizport's favour as they took Overpass 13-4. A map that could prove to be a breakout for their prodigy nilo, the young gun ended the map with a 22-5 statline.
Map three, Vertigo, was the closest map of the series - it ended with a 13-11 win for Metizport. It was also s1mple's worst map of the series, he ended with a 10-20 statline.
All credits for the Metizport victory have to go for jackinho, adamb, and ztr, the trio secured 61 kills between them to propel Metizport into the quarter-finals.
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