Image: Ubisoft/Michal Konkol
It wasn’t all smiles for Brazil on Friday, as one of their teams had to be sent home in the very last match of the day. After a 2-1 defeat to FaZe Clan, it was FURIA Esports who couldn’t progress to the next round.
FURIA are a special team. They are the only ones who have qualified for the seven international events since the COVID-19 pandemic began. In Brazil, the team might not lead the standings, but they clearly don’t have a lack of consistency.
After the departure of Marlon “Twister” Mello, the former world champion Julio “JULIO” Giacomelli joined the team. According to Luiz “Miracle” Abrantes, his new coach knows “the way to win, what it takes to be a champion.”
In Berlin, the team showed something different. FURIA finished above former Charlotte Major finalists Astralis, APAC’s best team Elevate, and promising European team MNM Gaming.
However, the team’s seventh international experience in a row was put to an end by FaZe Clan.
“In this tournament they played really different, they played really aggressive, but against us they saw that they couldn’t play like this,” explained JULIO. “So they played really slower, like taking the errors slower, we tried to counter them with some strategies like the Caveira one.”
FURIA were swept aside on Skyscraper, but a maximum overtime win on Chalet forced the third map.
Chalet’s final round was the highlight of the series, as Miracle was the man of the moment, getting himself an ace to recover a 3v5 deficit.
“When you get the opening kill on defense, like FaZe Clan did, they are going to play passive because they knew they had that round. But they really played too passive, we saw we could plant, and magic happens, miracles happen,” JULIO said, alluding to his player’s tag.
On Kafe, FaZe took control of the series again. According to JULIO, his team “tried to counter them” with different strategies and pointed out Diogo “Fntzy” Lima’s Caveira play on Kafe. Sadly for the team, it didn’t work.
“He is really good at doing this stuff, all the teams need a guy like this. Liquid is a really good team but doesn't have this really aggressive guy you know,” said the FURIA coach about Fntzy.
Fntzy’s numbers in Berlin were incredible, as he got 24 entry kills and 94 kills despite his survival rating, which was a lowly 12%.
“You just need to play around him, cause he is the guy, he is so confident, he can get these kills that 90% of the players wouldn’t, like, have the courage to try,” said JULIO.
With this loss, FURIA’s tournament is now over. However, the future is bright.
“We have improved a lot, things will be good in the future,” finished JULIO.
SiegeGG is supported by its audience. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Learn more about how readers support SiegeGG.