MOUZ vs Outsiders: Outsiders qualify for IEM Major Finals

With most of the favorites already eliminated at IEM Rio Major, the four remaining teams were not on everyone Pickems. MOUZ, Outsiders, Heroic and FURIA were the final four teams before today’s start. And the first match of the day was MOUZ vs Outsiders. 

MOUZ picked Ancient but Outsiders looked extremely comfortable on the map. They started on the defense, the favored side on Ancient and Outsiders took full advntage of it. MOUZ had the strategical advantage, often having a great read on the Outsiders playsytle and positioning. But on more than one occasion, MOUZ simply could not hit their shots and that cost them multiple rounds.

After MOUZ won the first few rounds, Outsiders strung together seven rounds in a row. They ultimately won three more rounds later in the first half to close out at 10-5. 

MOUZ won the second pistol as well - they won both the pistol rounds on Ancient. 

The IEM Rio Major is currently underway in Brazil and features a massive audience. The Home crowd has been vehemently supporting FURIA and will undoubtedly turn up at the venue to support their home team in numbers. With GauLes leading the FURIA cheerleading squad in his own way, the crowd has proved to be the sixth man for FURIA. On the Outsiders roster, N0rb3r7 was playing some exceptional CS, with 20 kills at half-time, miles ahead of anyone on MOUZ and even maintaining a distance from his own teammates.

Outsiders had a textbook Counterstrike performance on their T side. They were constantly suffocating the MOUZ players, who were often looking very confused about the Outsiders player positions. It was slow and painful, but textbook and ultimately, Outsiders won MOUZ's map pick of Ancient with a 16-10 score.

Overpass was a much closer affair and MOUZ looked very comfortable on this map. The two teams often traded strings of rounds and there was very little separating them on the scoreboard. However, MOUZ looked much more dominant in terms of their approach to the game and their read of the Outsiders playstyle.

But on the second half, Outsiders looked back in form. They had aggressive pushes on their A bombsite defense, which gave them a lot of information about MOUZ's movements across the map. Even if they lost players in the push, it was still valuable information which allowed them to play aggressive on another side of the map.

Outsiders took a lead on the CT side but right at the very end MOUZ managed a courageous comeback on the Tside. They were often playing super aggressive and their rotations caught the Outsiders players off-guard on more than one occasion. On the final round itself, MOUZ had a player inside CT spawn, highlighting how much of an inflitration their flanks were. With this 16-14 victory, MOUZ tied the series and took the match to Inferno - the classic series decider map in CS: GO Majors.

The third map saw a very dominating performance by Outsiders as they dominated their opponents. They won 16-7 and the series 2-1. Outsiders are the first team to qualify for the IEM Rio Major Grand Finals and will continue to meet the winner of FURIA and Heroic.

FURIA faces off against Heroic later today and the winner will earn a spot in the CS: GO Major grand finals.

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