Despite a shaky start to the year, the Flashpoint Three event, and this series, Vitality’s CS:GO team avoided disaster today with a comeback 2-1 victory over FunPlus Phoenix.
Vitality were a victim of a comeback in the first map of the series on Dust II. Despite a strong showing from Kévin “misutaaa” Rabier and a 10-5 lead at halftime, FPX’s CT-side was just better enough to steal away Vitality’s map pick 16-13.
FPX looked to take the series in two on their own map pick of Inferno and took a 9-6 lead into halftime. Vitality’s star Mathieu “ZywOo” Herbaut was absent on Inferno, but Dan “apEX” Madesclaire had a great performance with 30 kills to power the French T-side second half.
The series was sent to Vertigo and Vitality were finally able to secure and hold onto a lead. They led 9-6 at halftime and dominated the first five rounds of their T-side to eventually take a commanding 15-7 lead. Needing eight straight rounds just to force overtime, FPX could only muster three. Vitality took Vertigo 16-10 in a clinical performance, with 30 kills from ZywOo.
Vitality entered 2021 with high expectations after a strong end to the previous year, but they’ve fallen short in the first half of the campaign. This year, they’re 23-28 in 51 maps played, the only time in recent history that Vitality have had more losses than wins over an extended period of time. Aside from a third-place finish at the BLAST Global Final in January, all of their 2021 event results have been dismal and the former No. 1 team has fallen outside of the top 10 to No. 11 in the HLTV rankings.
Things hit a new low when Vitality lost to orgless French team DBL Poney, a squad led by former Vitality player Nathan “NBK-” Schmitt, in the first round of Flashpoint Three. But they’ve rebounded with a dominant win over OG and now an impressive comeback against FPX. They’ll continue on in the lower bracket of Flashpoint Three and await the winner of Heroic vs. Complexity later in the day.
Published: May 21, 2021 03:02 pm