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Vitality managed to close out a tight series against ViCi 2-0 (25-22 on Inferno, 16-12 on Nuke) to secure their third win of the Swiss stage and advance to the New Legends Stage.

ViCi had a clinical start to the CT side of Inferno, which was inspired by their AWPer Andrew "⁠kaze⁠" Khong, going 5-0 up on their map pick. Vitality finally got on the board in the next round and quickly broke the Chinese team's economy to make the score 5-3.

Lockdowns of A followed in the next two rounds, and with that, ViCi got back into control and extended their lead to 9-3. Vitality was on just pistols in round 13, but Nathan "⁠NBK-⁠" Schmitt found a key opening in apartments, allowing his team to overrun the A bombsite, and helping them to a recoverable 10-5 half time finish.

Vitality just barely scraped by ViCi on Inferno

Vitality locked down ViCi's mid push in the pistol as four CT's waited in a crossfire, but the French team failed to follow up on it, losing to a ViCi force-buy. The score was 13-6 before Vitality could afford a rifle-buy, and in the key round, Alex "⁠ALEX⁠" McMeekin came up huge on the B flank to allow his team to retake. Rounds were tightly contested after that, but somehow, Vitality kept their head above water and went on a streak of five rounds won, 14-12.

Mathieu "⁠ZywOo⁠" Herbaut locked down mid with a quad kill in the following round and an anti-eco retake setup on B worked out, seeing the score tied up at 14-14. However, neither team could close it out in regulation, as after Vitality reached map point, ViCi got their first Terrorist round in a while to force overtime.

It took three sets of added rounds to decide the victor, and despite kaze finishing on 42 kills, it was Vitality, powered by some phenomenal ZywOo clutches, that took the 25-22 victory on Inferno.

Kaze brought the heat on Inferno, but his team wasn't able to close it out

ViCi once again had a good start to the map on Nuke, getting a 4-0 lead before a push towards A and ramp worked out perfectly for Vitality, ALEX and NBK- finding entries, to get the Frenchmen on the board. That started a streak of rounds going Vitality's way and the score was turned into their favor. (5-4)

WeiJie "⁠zhokiNg⁠" Zhong quad-kill on the A bombsite hold stopped the bleeding, but Vitality were back in control shortly with a quick Mini push. ViCi still held on to the half, and secured the last three rounds to get eight rounds before the switch.

The Chinese side hit a wall in the Terrorist pistol, all five players going down without a single frag on the A rush, but got on board with their first rifle round to keep things tied up, 9-9. ZhiHong "⁠aumaN⁠" Liu's early vent dive in the next round was pivotal to ViCi continuing their winning streak (11-9), but ZywOo's triple on A allowed his team to stabilize. After ViCi's fast upper-site play worked out, they lost the following one and ended up reset economically. After that, they didn't manage to recover and Vitality won Nuke 16-12 to advance to the New Legends Stage.

IEM Katowice 2019 Challengers StageBest of 3 VitalityMatchpage 2 0 15th February 2019 ViCi 25Inferno 22 16Nuke 12

Vitality	K - D	+/-	ADR	Rating 2.0
Mathieu 'ZywOo' HerbautZywOo	65 - 44	+21	87.5	1.34
Nathan 'NBK-' SchmittNBK-	56 - 45	+11	90.7	1.28
Cédric 'RpK' GuipouyRpK	51 - 47	+4	74.3	1.07
Dan 'apEX' MadesclaireapEX	51 - 45	+6	69.1	1.06
Alex 'ALEX' McMeekinALEX	45 - 48	-3	63.1	0.91

ViCi	K - D	+/-	ADR	Rating 2.0
Andrew 'kaze' Khongkaze	54 - 49	+5	79.6	1.11
ZhiHong 'aumaN' LiuaumaN	46 - 53	-7	75.3	1.01
WingHei 'Freeman' CheungFreeman	52 - 52	0	61.5	0.90
WeiJie 'zhokiNg' ZhongzhokiNg	40 - 57	-17	72.9	0.86
Zhuo 'advent' Liangadvent	37 - 57	-20	60.6	0.83

The New Challengers stage 3W - 0L NRG Renegades 3W - 1L Vitality 2W - 1L TYLOO Winstrike ENCE AVANGAR 2W - 2L ViCi 1W - 2L fnatic FURIA Ninjas in Pyjamas G2 Vega Squadron Cloud9 0W - 3L Spirit Grayhound Nathan 'NBK-' Schmitt Age: 24 Team: Vitality Rating 1.0: 1.05 Maps played: 1473 KPR: 0.71 DPR: 0.66 Mathieu 'ZywOo' Herbaut Age: 18 Team: Vitality Rating 1.0: 1.33 Maps played: 320 KPR: 0.91 DPR: 0.64 Andrew 'kaze' Khong Age: 24 Team: ViCi Rating 1.0: 1.19 Maps played: 422 KPR: 0.79 DPR: 0.62 ViCi #35 Zhuo 'advent' LiangWeiJie 'zhokiNg' ZhongZhiHong 'aumaN' LiuAndrew 'kaze' KhongWingHei 'Freeman' Cheung Alex 'ALEX' McMeekin Age: 23 Team: Vitality Rating 1.0: 1.02 Maps played: 704 KPR: 0.72 DPR: 0.72 WeiJie 'zhokiNg' Zhong Age: 25 Team: ViCi Rating 1.0: 1.10 Maps played: 810 KPR: 0.78 DPR: 0.70 Vitality #15 Nathan 'NBK-' SchmittCédric 'RpK' GuipouyDan 'apEX' MadesclaireAlex 'ALEX' McMeekinMathieu 'ZywOo' Herbaut ZhiHong 'aumaN' Liu Age: 24 Team: ViCi Rating 1.0: 1.06 Maps played: 478 KPR: 0.73 DPR: 0.67