IEM Summer 2021 continued with Day 2 and some interesting results came up as EG took down Heroic and fnatic kept their game versus NIP competitive. Gambit eliminated Astralis in the lower bracket and OG took down CIS giants Virtus.Pro. Here’s a recap of the results.
Group B Lower Round 1
After Spirit got upset by Evil Geniuses in the opening round, they found themselves facing the Brazilian representatives in Imperial. The CIS squad were huge favourites and showed why as they absolutely decimated fer’s team. The individuals of Team Spirit all had a strong showing with degster and sdy carrying the first map Mirage to a 16-4 scoreline and mir and magixx taking their turn to frag on Dust2 for a 16-3 score. With this result, Imperial has been eliminated from IEM Summer which cuts short their official games in EU but they will be able to take advantage of the higher level of practice and improve themselves before returning to Brazil.
The other elimination game for group B was a clash of Swedes as NIP took on Fnatic. Where NIP has been on the upswing, Fnatic has been crashing down the rankings as JW and Golden have had a long run of poor performances. Going into this match NIP were the clear favourites but unlike the Spirit game, Fnatic actually put up a strong fight. The first map was Ancient which was picked by Fnatic, and after winning the pistol round they were immediately reset as NIP won the next 4 in a row. This was followed by some rounds being traded back and forth but NIP ended the half with a 10-5 half. The Ninjas reached map point before Fnatic was able to secure rounds but NIP quickly closed the game out at a 16-10 scoreline.
After a respectable first map, Fnatic turned the heat up and smacked NIP out of Overpass. Brollan and Jackinho fragged hard and Golden, who had been having poor individual performances, stepped up with 20 kills and secured the map for Fnatic with a dominant 16-8 scoreline. Fnatic continued their confident play onto the final map Inferno, where they quickly picked up a 9-0 lead off the back of a solid KRIMZ performance, but NIP broke their quiet streak and took the next 4 rounds closing the half out at 10-5 favouring Golden’s troops. In the second half REZ put on a masterclass picking up 21 kills as he powered his team to a 16-13 win, shattering Fnatic’s upset dreams and eliminating them in last place.
Group A Lower Semi-Finals
Continuing the lower bracket for group A, the Juggernaut Complexity taking on FPX. The teams started off on Inferno where domination on the T side was the name of the game. FPX started the proceedings with a dominant first half where they took 11 rounds with Maden continuing his strong form from yesterday’s Ancient game versus G2. When coL moved to the T side they returned the favour with poizon and k0nfig getting the kills needed to take the map to overtime with an 11 round half of their own. In overtime, however, blameF’s troops were unable to secure any rounds as FPX closed the game 19-15.
Overpass continued the trend of close games as the first half ended in an 8-7 half favouring FPX, but in the second half coL picked the game up with good output from JKS and k0nfig as they took the map 16-13, despite Maden’s very strong performance. Nuke finally gave blameF’s squad a continuous lead and they secured the map 16-10 eliminating FPX from the event.
The world no.1 Gambit bounced back from their upset loss to Vitality and took down Astralis in their lower bracket matchup. The Danes might have been the greatest but the CIS team has taken the crown and they showed their class in this game. The match started on Inferno and with Ax1le and sh1ro showing up, Gambit never let Astralis get a lead in the game. The half ended 9-6 and Gambit quickly closed the game 16-8 despite Magisk fragging as hard as he could. This was followed by Gambit’s best map Overpass, where nafany’s team continued their dominance this time with Hobbit joining Ax1le at the top. The first half was an even stronger 10-5 lead and quickly closed out at a 16-7 scoreline, eliminating Astralis from the event in their first pre-playoffs elimination at an MTG event since Magisk joined the squad.
Group B Upper Semi-Finals
Evil Geniuses were the 2nd lowest-ranked team in the event at the start, but they continue to upset top teams in IEM Summer 2021. Day 1 saw them take down Team Spirit and now they have upset Heroic in a closely fought series. The first map took us to EG’s pick Inferno where EG started off with a 4-0 lead. This was quickly traded back by Heroic as they played the half-close and ended with an 8-7 scoreline with Stanislaw’s troops barely edging out the win. The second half had EG take map point early at 15-11 but they were unable to close the game out as the Danes secured overtime. EG was finally able to close the game out with a 19-17 win.
EG looked like they would close the series out on Nuke itself as they pushed themselves into an 11-0 lead only to lose the next 10 in a row. Despite the dominant start, Heroic won the game 16-14, only conceding 3 rounds after EG’s initial spell. The final frontier was Mirage where oBo completely took over the game and carried the team to a 16-13 upset versus the World Rank 2 Heroic. This qualifies EG to the event playoffs and marks a resurgence for the team after many months of poor results.
The final game of the IEM Summer 2021 Day 2 was OG taking on Virtus.Pro. Jame’s squad was heavily favoured in the game but has had a record of losing favoured games which is what happened here. The first map was OG’s pick of Mirage which has always been a strong map for them. The first half was a close start to the game as Qikert and Jame fragged hard but were met by a strong performance out of valde. The X factor was a strong performance from mantuu which pushed OG over the finish line as they took the map 16-10.
Next up was VP’s pick of Overpass, but the CIS team was unable to capitalize on their pick on the T side, as OG had an even stronger start to the game picking up 11 rounds in the half. VP managed to pick 7 more rounds in the next half but OG closed off the game 16-11 with the newcomers niko and flameZ showing up to win the series and secure playoffs.
That’s a recap of IEM Summer 2021 Day 2. Lower Bracket Matches continue on Day 3 starting at 1:30 CEST. Watch the games live on ESL’s Twitch Channel and check out coverage of the event here.
