After their debut at Flashpoint 2 went sour, Cloud9 secured their first victory at BLAST Premier Fall Showdown since the lineup dubbed as the “Colossus” came together under the American banner in October. NiP have exited the Showdown in joint-last place, while Cloud9 will go on to play Complexity on Saturday at 19:30 .
Cloud9 turned up in good form at the start of the series against NiP, putting together a strong offense on their pick, Nuke. With a pistol round win and a dominant run in the middle of the half spearheaded by Özgür “woxic” Eker, the new team reached double digits on the less favored side and looked to pick up their first map victory as a team.
floppy’s heroics on Vertigo pushed Cloud9 over the finish line
NiP still had fuel left in the tank and won the second pistol to kick off a comeback attempt, with a 1v1 clutch by Tim “nawwk” Jonasson later on helping them equalize the map at 12-12. Their effort was all for naught, however, as Cloud9 strung together the last four rounds after finding key picks towards the ramp and in yard to win the opener 16-12.
Cloud9 went on to start off well on Vertigo in their first-ever appearance on the map, as the only round they lost out of the first six was to a red-hot Fredrik “REZ” Sterner, who picked up a quad-kill and clutched a 1v1. Momentum quickly shifted over to the Swedes, though, after a quick mid execute into an A explosion with just pistols gave them a key round, and NiP went on a big streak.
The half ended at 9-6 in Hampus “hampus” Poser‘s team’s favor and they were the first to reach double digits on the back of a forcebuy win. Cloud9 clawed back into contention with a couple of smart decisions in late-round situations, and with some big clutches, courtesy of William “mezii” Merriman and Ricky “floppy” Kemery, they came out victorious after a nail-biting finish to Vertigo at 16-14.
