Falcons edge out Vitality in marquee win

Falcons won two out of three 13-11s to claim a spot in the semi-finals.

The best team of all time have once more fallen to their bogey team, and karrigan has produced another bit of magic on the Cologne stage to give himself another shot at another Major trophy.

This was something of a coming-of-age game for kyousuke, who had his big time, bigger stage step-up to motor Falcons past the #1 seed. The teenager had masses of impact even if at times the scoreboard didn't show it, but also racked up lots of kills by the end of the series too. He had the most opening kills in the series and some absolutely crucial multikills, especially on the final map.

He was the stand-out player on Anubis, as Falcons raced into a 5-0 lead just to be pegged back to 6-6 at the half; but given the T-sided nature of Anubis, six CT rounds always felt like it would be enough, and so it proved. There were about three CT rounds that kyousuke won on his own with a multikill, or the most important kill at the perfect time, as he rotated into danger and came out squeaky clean.

karrigan has faced some criticism over his fragging - some of it from us - but he was not a liability whatsoever today and that was probably just enough to tip the scales. He was not being abused and bullied as easily as usual, and that's a terrifying prospect for the rest of the world.

Falcons managed to win in round 24, taking the first map and a map that felt very important if they were to beat Vitality.

We've barely talked about the AWPers so far, but map two was all them.

ZywOo and m0NESY went blow-for-blow, combining for 51 frags in the 24 rounds, with the Frenchman just pipping m0NESY with 26, and more importantly, 13 rounds.

Inferno isn't always known as an AWPer's paradise, but today it was - though m0NESY was getting a lot done with the rifle, too. Remarkably, both players found more joy on the T side, but ZywOo more traditionally in post-plants and punishing, and m0NESY with the AK47.

mezii, who had a quiet game through most of the series, won one very important clutch in this game to just about push Vitality over the line, though they did have karrigan to thank a little bit.

Just forget what we said about his fragging. He dropped four on this map.

He was, admittedly, far better on Dust 2, the deciding map and so often a lock for Vitality. karrigan collected 15 kills, though did go 1:7 in opening duels, which isn't brilliant. m0NESY's 23 was the pick of the bunch as ZywOo faded, but kyousuke again had so much impact even with the smaller kill total.

We've not mentioned NiKo all article, and the truth is that he was able to sit back a little more today and let his children do the work for him. In some ways, how fitting would it be for him to finally get his Major, and it's one where he doesn't have to be the star at all - just at ease sitting back.

There was also some very important rounds from the oft-unfairly maligned TeSeS, who despite the noise around him has been stellar since karrigan came in and posted another great showing in a crucial moment for Falcons. In fact, it was he and karrigan who did a lot of the damage on the Falcons defence to get them the five rounds they needed after an 8-4 first half.

It felt like kyousuke was integral to those eight rounds, with multiple rounds being won off of an entry, or an important trade on the rotator, or a multikill to lock down the site. The Russian 'only' had eleven kills, but every single kill felt like it decided a round or changed a round in ways lots of other players fail to do.

There was an air of inevitability once it seemed like Vitality were coming back - a feeling deep on your stomach that they'd get it done, but that feeling was off-base. Falcons wobbled but did not fall, and locked out Vitality in round 24 to deny the comeback and claim their spot against Spirit today.