- FURIA’s KSCERATO scored a massive rating, but it was not enough to get his team ahead
- This match was MR’s JUST and adamS’ first LAN match with the new squad after signing in July
- The Brazilians almost overturned the match on the second map but flopped at the end
Movistar Riders win the chance to reach the ESL Pro League Season 18’s playoffs, after almost flopping the huge lead they had against FURIA in the event’s Group A opening match.
Movistar Riders Defeat FURIA
ESL Pro League Season 18 kicked off on August 30 and the first winners have already been decided. Movistar Riders are among their ranks after managing a 2-0 victory over FURIA in the event’s first Group A match, and the Spanish majority team will be facing Gamer Legion next for a chance to win a spot in the playoffs.
Meanwhile, FURIA falls to the lower bracket in Malta, where they will play Grayhound on Thursday at 13:30 to avoid a trip down to Group A’s last chance stage. Despite the loss, the Brazilian team can take some solace in the fact that Kaike “KSCERATO” Cerato played tremendously well, coming back from a recent food poisoning, which barred him from attending his team’s Pinnacle Cup V grand final match. However, the 23-year-old player came back swinging and posted a more than impressive rating of 1.72 thanks to his 62/34 K/D.
It should be noted that Movistar Riders achieved victory despite two of their players, Tiago “JUST” Moura from Portugal and Adam “adamS” Marian from Romania having their debuts with the team at the said match. Both signed their contracts in July, so this was their first LAN challenge playing for MR. AdamS, in particular, performed the best of his team, topping everybody else with a 1.27-rated performance.
How Did the Match Go?
Although KSCERATO’s individual performance was much better than adamS’, it was still not enough for him to lead FURIA to victory, as the team lost both Overpass and Nuke. It’s interesting to note that the first map was chosen by MR, which is very strange, considering the team had a dismal 0% win rate over three outings in the past three months heading into the fixture.
However, it seems the Spanish side had learned from their mistakes, as MR managed to plant the bomb 11 times during the first half, finishing it with a comfortable lead of 9-6. From then, the Spanish team managed to quickly finish the map to 18-8, with only KSCERATO and his 27 kills posing a real challenge, which was not enough to turn the tides in favor of FURIA.
It seems this loss severely hurt the Brazilians’ morale, as when the maps changed to Nuke, they were nowhere to be seen. MR quickly gained the initiative and ran away with the score, posting a massive lead of 11-0, largely thanks to Antonio “Martinez” Martinez’s AWP skills.
However, it was at this point that FURIA jumped back to life, winning four consecutive rounds to show they were still in the fight. MR managed to respond, but that was not enough, as KSCERATO once again showed his prowess, propelling the team to a dead-even 13-13 stalemate.
Unfortunately for FURIA, however, they ran out of stamina right when they could have overturned the match. MR saw their chance and took it, quickly winning three more rounds to end Nuke with a score of 16-13 and win the match 2-0. Now the team will face Gamer Legion, while FURIA is relegated to the lower bracket.
