In recent times, Astralis looked like a team to beat in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive esports scene. During last weekend’s Intel Extreme Masters Katowice 2019 the team picked up yet another major title, thus equaling Fnatic record by winning three major CS: GO tournaments in a row.
Astralis has defeated ENCE Esports, a team from Finland in best-of-three grand final series. Only two games were required for Astralis to secure the victory, and end an epic ENCE’s run through the European Minor, the New Challengers and the New Legends stages, and playoffs against Team Liquid and Natus Vincere.
While the first game in the finals for ENCE Esports who picked up a few early rounds looked quite promising, Astralis quickly responded and took control over the game. At halftime Astralis were leading 11 to 4, however, the second pistol round once again was more successful for ENCE, which made a slight comeback. Before the last two rounds, the result was 14-11, but Astralis managed to steal de_Train victory 16-14.
Astralis brought their momentum into the second map of the series de_Inferno dominating over the Finish side. Astralis crushed all hopes during the first half of the map storming through ENCE’s defense 14-1. After switching sides there wasn’t much that ENCE Esports could do, so Astralis took the map as well as the game 16-4.
IEM Katowice 2019 Major title is the third that Astralis has earned in a fairly short period. Their previous victories being in
You can check out more photos from the event here.
