The Danish dominance of Counter Strike: Global Offensive continued, with Astralis claiming yet another title at IEM Chicago.
Astralis entered this event appearing to be more vulnerable than ever before, with their poor showing at the BLAST Pro Series: Copenhagen giving hope to other top squads that they could finally be on the down turn.
During the group stage this theory at least seemed plausible, with Astralis suffering their first 2-0 series loss for a long time when they fell to FaZe Clan in what was essentially the Group A winners’ match. Astralis were duly placed into the quarter-finals rather than being given an automatic berth in the semis.
mouz swept aside
Astralis then met a mousesports side who play a similar skill-based brand of Counter Strike, with the squad bringing some hype to the match-up given the recent return of STYKO.
mouz looked to attack Astralis’ map pool by picking Train, seemingly one of the weakest in Astralis’ pool. However, Astralis were more than prepared, as they dominated 16-5 before following that effort up with a 16-13 success on their ever-undefeated Nuke to seal a place in the semi-finals.
Fnatic put up a fight
In the last four, Astralis faced another team trending in the right direction, in this case a Fnatic squad coming off roster changes and with a renewed hunger for the game.
This was the most exciting series that Astralis were a part of at this event, with the favourites opening with a narrow 16-14 victory on Dust 2.
However, Fnatic were able to battle back on Mirage and post a 16-12 win which left everything riding on Inferno. This map came down to an amazing comeback from Astralis, in which they pulled off six rounds in a row to force overtime, where they would eventually win 19-17 in exhilarating fashion.
Liquid in final
In the final, Astralis would face opponents who they have got used to meeting in the latter stages of events, namely Team Liquid.
The writing appeared to be on the wall before the series even started, given both Astralis’ dominance over Liquid and Liquid’s continued struggles in finals.
Everything was riding on map one, Mirage, with Team Liquid needing momentum with a best-of-five series in store. Unfortunately for Liquid it was the worst outcome possible, as they got their energy and hope up by getting the scoreline up to 14-10 before Astralis closed out the final six rounds in a row to claim a devastating 16-14 victory and all but killing Team Liquid’s hopes.
From there, things got better and better for Astralis and they were able to close out Liquid cleanly on both Nuke (16-7) and Inferno (16-4) to complete a 3-0 sweep and come away as champions of IEM Chicago.
dev1ce named top player
Astralis were in need of a rebound and they certainly answered their critics, with their only series loss in Chicago coming off a Herculean effort from NiKo.
Earning yet another MVP award was dev1ce, who continues to be one of the only players able to threaten s1mple for the status of best player in the world, given his terrific consistency.
What is even more soul crushing for the other top teams is that Astralis appear to be set up for the long haul, given a single player’s drop off will not completely crush the team as it would for Natus Vincere, FaZe or Liquid.
Astralis have built a foundation on which their strategies function. It is only complemented by the skill they have within the line-up, rather than being reliant on it.
