MOUZ' failed plot and four more things we learnt from PGL Cluj-Napoca

While on the face of it, another Vitality win leads us only to conclusions we’ve made a hundred times before, there’s a bit more bubbling beneath the surface after PGL Cluj-Napoca.

Below the peak of the iceberg, there lies hope, despair and dysfunction - but we’ve picked out just a few of the things you can take away from PGL Cluj-Napoca.

1. PARIVISION are legit… sort of

PARIVISION are a genuinely good team who probably aren’t a top three team.

While on the face of it two finals in three tournaments should put them right at the top of the list of Vitality’s biggest threats, this finals appearance comes off the back of some lucky breaks and among some of the big boys’ biggest issues.

While it can be argued that the dysfunction of the big teams is exactly why PARIVISION are a top three team, it just doesn’t feel like they would have won that quarter-final game against Falcons very many times out of ten, with Falcons being the architect of their downfall in increasingly bizarre ways. While, yes, that does happen far more often than it should, one has to imagine a team that keeps getting this far won’t do that every time they face off, and would probably have just won that series on most days.

All five players on PARIVISION undershot their duel swing%, which suggests they were actually pretty underfiring. In some ways this gives credence to the idea that maybe they’re just outthinking teams and able to win even without massive firepower overperformance, but what seems more likely is that actually they will struggle to compete consistently without outshooting anyone.

Vitality ain’t underperforming their duel swing any time soon.

2. MOUZ can’t be villains

One of the big defining parts of being a villain is you have to be a believable threat right until the bitter end, but nobody really believes MOUZ are going to win an event. Seemingly, not even MOUZ.

Similarly, one cannot come out and proclaim that the fans booing you is affecting you negatively, because no villain has ever been put off by that.

MOUZ have been ‘one roster move’ away from greatness since, well COVID it feels like, and the Spinx move almost was the one that did it, but we’re back at square one. Rumours of Jimpphat’s imminent departure were greatly exaggerated, but MOUZ appeared to be banking on that as their way of being able to make a change, and now are left with the same team, the same problems, and the same results as before. They simply cannot win events; be that stage yips or a more gameplay-focused diagnosis (of which there are a handful, but none so great an issue as the stage problems), they refuse to win big games.

3. G2 aren’t perfect, but they’re not awful

A finish outside the top eight is far from ideal for a team that is supposed to be knocking on the door of the top five, especially with one of said top five not at the event - but it’s not quite as poor a result as it appears on the surface.

G2’s losses came against the two grand finalists and NAVI, who are essentially in the same category of team as they are. PARIVISION should also be considered in that bracket if you remember point one, and that was not a particularly great result given the one-sided nature of the decider, but how often does HeavyGod play that badly?

And anyway, it’s possible we’re wrong and losing to PARIVISION is actually an expected result, if PV are a genuine top tier team.

The choke against NAVI from 9-3 up to losing 9-13 was pretty embarrassing, and in both maps of that series they completely soiled the sheets in the second half. They were a combined 16-8 in first halves, and 0-18 in second halves in that series, which paints a picture. It’s obviously worrying, but doesn’t seem to be part of a larger trend outside of G2 generally being a bit… well, Spursy.

We’re not writing them off just yet - they’re definitely not in that FaZe tier.

4. FaZe are the new Virtus.pro (derogatory)

We don’t mean Jame’s Virtus.pro here either, we mean the paszaBiceps is going 3-16 against mid-tier teams VP.

VP were everyone’s second team, and would have one or two LANs a year where they just showed up and rocked everyone’s world. A combination of momentum, experience and the power of friendship seemed to propel them against the best teams in the world to heights they used to be accustomed to but hadn’t for a little while, and get more out of players who were mostly rubbish for the rest of the year.

Sounds familiar.

FaZe were absolutely atrocious for large portions of last year and they weren’t much better in Romania. They beat HEROIC, who still don’t have a full roster, and then lost three in a row. You could say that losses to Falcons and PARIVISION aren’t disasters, but a 0-2 loss to a plucky but ultimately not-there-yet Astralis doesn’t give us much to cling on to.

It’s just very reminiscent of those aging VP teams, where you want them to win out of sheer hope and nothing else, and at some point they probably will make a grand final somehow, but until then we have to watch broky miss shots he absolutely should never miss for months on end.

It’d be amusing if it wasn’t so frustrating.

5. FUT have got it

Whatever ‘it’ is, FUT have got it.

Everyone knew they had the talent and ability to go far but we’re not sure many expected them to be this dangerous, this fast. They pushed FURIA to the wire and probably should have beaten them all things considered, and had chances against PARIVISION still to make the playoffs.

lauNX’s rebirth (which seems crazy to say - he’s the same age as m0NESY) has been incredible to watch, and dem0n and dziugsss look ready for the elite tier already. cmtry is stable if unspectacular, but sometimes that’s all you need with a rifle core like this, and Krabeni’s calling doesn’t look out of place in tier one.

They’re on the cusp of being a top eight team as they improve map by map, and have time on their side, while so many teams are treading water.

It now feels like by the next Major they’ll actually be in with a shot at playoffs - moreover, they’ll be disappointed not to make at least top eight, and they’ll give anyone a run for their money in the quarter-final, too.

There isn’t much to get excited about team-wise in CS at the moment with such few changes, but FUT are making up for that in spades.