Outsiders complete reverse-sweep over FURIA, advance to EPL quarter-finals

Outsiders are through to the quarter-finals of ESL Pro League Season 16 after triumphing 2-1 over FURIA. The Russians dropped their map pick of Ancient 11-16, bounced back on Vertigo 16-10 and dominated on Inferno, 16-6. Evgenii “⁠FL1T⁠” Lebedev shined on the last two maps of the series as he finished with 1.43 and 1.72 ratings on Vertigo and Inferno, respectively.

FURIA exit the competition in 9-12th place, a far cry from their EPL Season 15 campaign in which they reached the semi-finals and placed 3-4th overall. Outsiders, on the other hand, have secured one of their highest Big Event finishes of the year regardless of how the rest of their EPL run plays out.

Outsiders drew first blood on Ancient and garnered a 6-2 lead early on as Dzhami “⁠Jame⁠” Ali constantly switched up the offense by either playing spread out across the map or focused on a single bomb site. FURIA turned things around in the latter part of the half and won five of the last seven rounds, eventually reducing their deficit to just one at the break. Yuri “⁠yuurih⁠” Santos boosted his team’s resurgence and ended the first half atop the scoreboard with 12 kills, ten of which came in the last seven rounds.

Andrei “⁠arT⁠” Piovezan‘s side kicked off the second period in dominant fashion, racking up five straight rounds as Outsiders put up barely any resistance on defense. The CIS squad broke their opponents’ streak in the 21st and showed some fight in the dying stages of the game, but in the end were unable to find an answer for FURIA‘s aggression and superior map presence. The Brazilians took home the 16-11 win on Ancient and 1-0 series lead entering their map pick of Vertigo.

Vertigo began just like Ancient did with Outsiders firmly in the lead at 6-2. Jame and company wouldn’t let their advantage slip this time around as the Russians went into the switch up 11-4 thanks to firm site control and FURIA‘s economic struggles. arT was the lone star on the Brazilians’ side with a 1.56 first half rating and an ace in the 21st round as the rest of his team struggled to make any impact.

FURIA scored the first three rounds coming out of halftime to reduce the gap to four, but Outsiders quickly struck back and reached map point at 15-8. The Brazilians wouldn’t go down without a fight and picked up back-to-back rounds, however Outsiders‘ lead was just too much to overcome as the Russians clinched Vertigo 16-10 and sent the series to a decider on Inferno.

The Brazilians struck first and claimed the opening pistol, but from then on it was all Outsiders who held a staggering 11-4 lead at halftime. FURIA looked completely lost even after swapping sides which gave Jame‘s men the opening to claim map and series point at 15-4. FURIA had a last-gasp effort to try and bring themselves back in the game, but the score was ultimately too far out of reach as FL1T dealt the final blow to wrap up the map 16-6.

Outsiders‘ next match will be against Group A winners Vitality on Friday at 15:30 for a semi-final spot at ESL Pro League.