Furia recovers from what could have been one of the biggest upsets of the opening stage. Wildcard pushed them to overtime, but they fell short, as the Brazilians won the battle of endurance.
VETO
- Wildcard removed Dust2
- Wildcard removed Anubis
- FURIA removed Ancient
- FURIA removed Inferno
- FURIA removed Nuke
- Wildcard removed Mirage
- Vertigo was left over
Map 1: Vertigo; Winner: Furia; Score: 16-14
A tumultuous start to the map saw both teams trading rounds before either team could find stability. Wildcard exceeded expectations as they could keep Furia at bay despite lacking top-flight experience. susp and Jba were instrumental in putting together an offense that was able to end the first half with a leveled scoreline.
In the second half, Wildcard built on the momentum from the first half and reached the map point considerably earlier, but it was then that Furia started mounting their comeback. A streak of 5 rounds from the Brazilians took the game away from Wilcards and into overtime.
Despite their stellar performance in the first half, Wildcard couldn’t outlast Furia in a game of endurance as the latter managed to keep their heads in the right place and were largely better drilled to close out the game.
skullz and KSCERATO’s profound impact made a difference for Fuira even when Wildcard was dominating for the better part of the regulation. As things stand, FURIA is just a win away from qualification while Wildcard would need two to make it through.
 on Vertigo at the PW Shanghai Major.){kind=link}