North beat Liquid; to EPL final

North are through to the grand final of the ESL Pro League Season 5 finals after defeating Team Liquid on two maps.

The series kicked off Liquid's pick, Nuke, but the final score would have suggested otherwise. The North Americans first managed to break through North's defence only six rounds into the game, and then they had to deal with an instant reset as Mathias "⁠MSL⁠" Lauridsen clutched a 1v2 situation.

With the control of the economy, the Danish team kept their defence tight, and they showed incredible discipline until the end of the half, limiting their opponents to just two rounds.

The second half began with Emil "⁠Magisk⁠" Reif winning a 1v2 clutch to secure the pistol round. After watching North hit match point, Liquid made one final push and secured three rounds in a row, only to collapse in another 2v1 situation against Magisk.

North advance to the final

Map two, Mirage, began with North successfully executing an A push in the pistol round, with Kristian "⁠k0nfig⁠" Wienecke getting four kills to his name. However, they were unable to follow it up as Liquid hit back on a force buy thanks to an ace from Jonathan "⁠EliGE⁠" Jablonowski.

For most of the half, Liquid's defence was successful in keeping out North's attacks. Every time that a round went the Danes' way, they were immediately countered by the North Americans, who took 11 rounds into the second half.

EliGE went huge in the pistol round as Terrorist and picked up three kills to put his team up by eight rounds. This time around, it was Liquid who were caught out by a force-buy round from North, who would go on a nine-round winning streak, taking the lead on the map for the first time since the first round.

EliGE got 35 frags on Mirage, but it was not enough

With no room for error, Liquid's offence finally got off the ground, allowing them to pick up three rounds in a row and hit map point. But they were unable to close it out and let North equalise the score after a shoddy buy at 15-13. Despite some key frags from Peter "⁠stanislaw⁠" Jarguz in overtime, the Danes would win two rounds in both halves of overtime to secure their spot in the grand final.

ESL Pro League Season 5 FinalsBest of 3 NorthMatchpage 2 0 3rd June 2017 Liquid 16Nuke 5 19Mirage 17

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Jonathan 'EliGE' Jablonowski Age: 19 Team: Liquid Rating 1.0: 1.07 Maps played: 545 KPR: 0.75 DPR: 0.70 Mathias 'MSL' Lauridsen Age: 22 Team: North Rating 1.0: 0.92 Maps played: 1075 KPR: 0.65 DPR: 0.72 Kristian 'k0nfig' Wienecke Age: 20 Team: North Rating 1.0: 1.11 Maps played: 580 KPR: 0.76 DPR: 0.68 Emil 'Magisk' Reif Age: 19 Team: North Rating 1.0: 1.13 Maps played: 481 KPR: 0.76 DPR: 0.63 Peter 'stanislaw' Jarguz Age: 23 Team: Liquid Rating 1.0: 1.00 Maps played: 472 KPR: 0.68 DPR: 0.67