G2 have broken their quarter-final curse at FISSURE Playground 3, taking FURIA down 2-0 to make the top-four of a Big Event for the first time since winning BLAST Open London over a year ago.
The result is an impressive one for G2 as whilst FPG 3 features a relatively weak field, they have beaten one of the highest ranked teams in attendance to get to the semi-finals.
FURIA will be left ruing the fact they let Ancient slip through their fingers, as they were in pole position to secure the map at 11-7 up and were in general outplaying their opponents tactically.
G2 got enough impact out of their individuals to get Ancient over the line, particularly from Matúš “MATYS” Šimko, before the entire squad stepped up to dominate a downtrodden FURIA on Dust2, continuing their tournament campaign into a semi-final against BETBOOM.
FURIA were sluggish individually at the start of Ancient, G2 bouncing back from a pistol loss to take a 5-2 lead on the T side despite often walking headlong into stacked areas of the map.
A combination of Danil “molodoy” Golubenko’s AWP finding impact early and Yuri “yuurih” Santos’ rifle clutching up late got FURIA up and running, and they duly punished G2’s weak default and poor calling, racking up a 7-5 lead heading into the second half.
A force-buy war kicked off the second half and G2 seemed to have gotten the better of it thanks to some excellent work by Nikita “HeavyGod” Martynenko, but G2 fumbled to molodoy’s hero Galil and Mareks “YEKINDAR” Gaļinskis’s armor-less Tec-9, allowing FURIA to run out to an 11-7 score.
G2 revived their defense with some proactive play, MATYS stepping up in a big way, and the game became a real battle, individual moments swinging rounds back and forth all the way into OT, where G2 eventually prevailed.
After an entertaining fight on Ancient, the series ended with a whimper on Dust2, FURIA falling away as G2 dominated. FURIA’s individuals never got going whilst G2’s ran riot, their impact being felt across the map to end the series in quick fashion and secure a semi-final spot.
