2020 has started off incredibly well for the Na`vi members: they reached the finals of 3 consecutive LAN tournaments and secured 2 championship titles, including the prestigious IEM Katowice 2020. Shortly after, they rose to the number one spot in the world rankings on hltv after more than 4 years of waiting and have maintained this position since. At ESL Pro League Season 11, despite the challenges of competing online after over 2 years of LAN play affecting their performance, Na`vi suffered 2 losses and faced the risk of elimination. However, once again, S1mple and his teammates responded with 3 consecutive victories, impressively taking the top position in the standings and securing a spot in the playoff round of the tournament.
Their first opponent in the playoffs is a name full of history: Astralis. During the 2018 – 2019 period, the Danish team was a very tough opponent and made the “Golden Dragon” suffer on numerous occasions, particularly at the FACEIT London Major final when they easily defeated Na`vi 2-0 in the grand finals. However, entering 2020, everything changed completely as in their last 2 encounters, Na`vi emerged victorious: a thrilling 2-1 win at the BLAST Premier Spring Series and a convincing 2-0 victory in the IEM Katowice 2020 semifinals. Competing in ESL Pro League Season 11, both Na`vi and Astralis topped the standings and last night they clashed for the third time within just 4 months.
Astralis demonstrated their careful preparation for this showdown by actively picking Inferno and surprisingly banning Nuke, a map they excel on, while Na`vi has been performing extremely well lately. Na`vi responded with Dust2, and the final map was Train, a map where both teams perform well.
It seems that recently, Astralis has thoroughly researched Na`vi on the Inferno map as they displayed a very flexible and proactive playstyle on the T-side, causing Na`vi to struggle significantly in defending the bomb sites. IGL Gla1ve made very reasonable and precise calls; the score of 10-5 after the first half showcased Astralis’s dominance, and in the second half, the Danes did not give their opponents any chance to come back, easily winning 6 rounds in a row and closing out map 1 with a dominant score of 16-5.
Continuing their momentum from map 1, Astralis quickly took a 4-0 lead in map 2; however, that was all they could achieve in the first half as Na`vi exploded with 10 consecutive rounds. S1mple continued to perform well as usual with spectacular plays, and when players like flamie and electronic are effective, Astralis has virtually no chance. Map 2 ended with a score of 16-10 in favor of Na`vi, and in the third map, Na`vi also easily secured a 16-8 victory after gaining 10 rounds on the T-side. The final score was 2-1 for the “Golden Dragon.”
The victory against their arch-rival Astralis will surely boost Na`vi’s confidence and excitement for the upcoming matches; for Astralis fans, there’s no need to be too disheartened as they still have 4 more matches in ESL Pro League Season 11 and still hold the opportunity to secure a spot in the Finals, but they have much work to do as their upcoming opponents are no walk in the park: Mousesports, FaZe Clan, and Fnatic…
In other matches yesterday, FaZe Clan fell 1-2 to Fnatic, while Mousesports easily defeated OG with a 2-0 score.
ESL Pro League Season 11 will continue to play every evening and will be broadcast live in Vietnamese on the Youtube channel of 500Bros Studio.