Global Esports had to endure a tough time on Split but made it look easy on Haven to register a 2-0 series win over Team XO (13-11 Split, 13-2 Haven) in a Group B encounter in the TEC Gauntlet Season 2.
XO went for the experimental Kay-O pick, with Simar ‘psy’ Sethi taking control of the agent while Prabhdeep ‘Ghost’ Bhatia donned the Sage in a Jett-less composition. Global Esports went for the tried and tested Jett and Raze pick with Breach as the go-to initiator. Things started well for XO, with Saransh ‘whimp’ Dang copping a triple kill to rescue the pistol. Ganesh ‘SkRossi’ Gangadhar’s triple kill to defend A site won Global their first round. Shailesh ‘blackhawk’ Dalvi’s triple kill on the eco for XO saw them take over A site and bag a thrifty to make it 3-1. The lead soon extended to 7-1 for XO, with Global unable to put a stop to XO’s attacks. They soon started returning fire, winning two rounds in a row. However, XO seemed to have almost won the 11th round after planting the spike at B and using Killjoy’s Lockdown. But, SkRossi came to the fore with a flashy quad-kill to rescue the round and make it 7-4. Two consecutive flawless rounds cut the lead down to a single point, with the anti-eco conversion evening out the scoreline at 7-7. XO retook sites from Global two rounds in a row to re-establish a two-round cushion. However, XO were soon undone by SkRossi, who copped a triple kill on the eco as Global bagged a thrifty. Three kills from Bhavin ‘HellRanger’ Kotwani on the A rush saw Global take up an 11-9 lead. The two teams traded rounds, with the score evenly poised at 12-11. The final round of regulation saw Global rush A from the get-go, with positive skirmishes yielding them the round to close out the map 13-11.
Global continued their newfound romance with the Breach pick on Haven, with SkRossi on Jett as the solo duelist while XO shifted to a Sova-Skye combination as Ghost reverted to his signature Jett. XO won the pistol once again, retaking the B site with numbers to get the defuse in. Global force-bought and recorded a flawless round to make it 1-1. The 4th round saw SkRossi pull off a triple kill with the Blade Storm at A to make it 3-1. XO finally doubled their tally, winning the 7th round after shutting Global down, who couldn’t plant the spike in time. A triple kill from Abhirup Paul ‘Lightningfast’ Choudhury at C saw Global end the half with a 10-2 lead. The double kill from SkRossi with the Sheriff from CT lane at C link turned the round in Global’s favour, with the Defenders winning the pistol. The anti-eco conversion brought up the match point. Global found themselves in a 4v3 advantage on the retake attempt at C. psy tried his best to deny Global the retake, with a double kill from underneath Garage window. But, Lightningfast and Jayanth ‘skillZ’ Ramesh combined to take back the C site in time to defuse and win the map 13-2.
SkRossi had another blinder of a match, with 51 kills over just 39 rounds, with an ADR of 223.4 and an ACS of 365 over the entire series, making him the WD Black MVP of the match.
