This year’s biggest tournament so far has made a grand final! IEM Champion NAVI, beat their enemy G2 by 3-0 at IEM Cologne 2021.
By defeating Gambit at StarLadder CIS RMR 2021 and becoming a champion, NAVI also became successful here as well. However, none of the CS:GO fans had expected NAVI to be this successful. Especially, considering the last 2 years’ performances.
Having had a superior group stage at IEM Cologne, the Russians had the right to start the play-offs directly from the semi-finals. Afterwards, NAVI became the team that managed to use this advantage to the fullest. The back-to-back defeat of FaZe Clan and G2 was the main factor that made NAVI champions. Returning to the LAN format after a long time, the CS:GO community has recognized its opponent, which they should fear in the offline environment.
IEM Champion NAVI and their competitive match!
NAVI, which started voting with the Vertigo ban, used its map preferences in favour of Dust 2 and Nuke. G2‘s map response, which banned Overpass, was Mirage and Inferno.
NAVI, who managed to win the first half 8-7 in Dust 2, showed a flawless performance on the CT side. Capturing the momentum with this performance, NAVI closed the map 16-11 ahead. G2, which performed effectively in the map chosen by NAVI, managed to raise their morale a little bit. In this way, G2, who made a good start to Mirage, which was their choice, could not prevent closing the first half behind. Despite their recovery in the second half, G2, who closed the map 16-14 behind, started to feel that their hopes were over.
By the time of the last map, Nuke, morale was high in NAVI. The fact that the series was 2-0 and they chose the map themselves gave the Russian team a serious advantage. Using this advantage positively, NAVI closed the map 16-13 ahead. They also became the IEM champion by leading the series 3-0.
NAVI, the IEM Cologne 2021 champion, won the grand prize of $400,000. They also managed to put up the tournament MVP from their own team. The star player s1mple, who achieved a 1.51/2.0 rating throughout the tournament, became the MVP of IEM Cologne 2021. Attracting attention with his performance in the last tournaments, the Ukrainian player is well ahead of his rival ZywOo.
