The Team Liquid Counter-Strike 2 project copped heavy criticism at its end but dubious pundits have been silenced following the team’s explosive start to their season at BLAST Premier Fall Groups, which included back-to-back wins against world number one squad NAVI.
The Twistzz-led outfit shocked NAVI—and the wider CS2 world—by booking an early ticket to the Fall Final after two 2-1 wins over the reigning Major champions this weekend. Liquid opened their BLAST ledger with a relatively clean 2-0 against Virtus.pro off the back of brilliant performances from Canadian duo Twistzz and NAF before new Polish AWPer Roland “ultimate” Tomkowiak stepped up against NAVI in the upper bracket final.
Many were willing to write off the win as a one-off, but there was no denying Liquid’s resurgence when they repeated the win after NAVI fought back to the group final. This time it was under fire Latvian Mareks “YEKINDAR” Gaļinskis who made the magic happen as Liquid fought back to tie the series in overtime, then put on a CT clinic on Inferno to come back and snatch the series.
“I’m just super proud of my team, we put up some stellar CT sides,” Twistzz said, adding the team offered comfort and freedom to youngster ultimate, who had a hand in directing the squad around to best suit the situation. Alongside the addition of the unknown quantity in ultimate and Aussie rifler jks, all eyes were on how Twistzz would take on the captaincy role for the first time—but early signs are great.
“No regrets, it’s super fun. If I didn’t [take the role] I wouldn’t get to play with amazing players. Everything happens for a reason, this tournament is a learning experience so far and I’m looking forward to calling for my team,” Twistzz said.
Missing the mark, however, has been the revamp of Cloud9. The Russian squad showed promise in their opening series against FaZe, but a defeat there and against Ninjas in Pyjamas means the new lineup will need to fight through the Fall Showdown if they want to keep their BLAST Finals chance alive. Things only worsened after C9’s BLAST exit, dropping the BetBoom Dacha Belgrade qualifier to little-known Swedish squad Johnny Speeds late yesterday.
The remaining BLAST Fall Groups squads battle in the final Play-In later today, while the bulk of CS2‘s top squads prepare for IEM Cologne later this week—an event C9 will miss entirely after dropping their squad, and therefore, their ESL ranking points.
