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Ukrainian esports team NAVI defeats Russia's Virtus.pro to reach IEM Rio 2024 semifinals

Friday, 11 October 2024, 21:00
Ukrainian esports team NAVI defeats Russia's Virtus.pro to reach IEM Rio 2024 semifinals
Justinas "jL" Lekavičius. Photo: Intel Extreme Masters on Twitter (X)

The Ukrainian esports team Natus Vincere (Born to Win, or NAVI) (1) has defeated Russia’s Virtus.pro (9) in the Counter-Strike 2 quarter-finals at Intel Extreme Masters (IEM) Rio 2024.

Source: Champion, a sports news platform within Ukrainska Pravda’s holding company

Details: The match ended with a 2-0 victory for NAVI.

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The first round took place on the Inferno map, which was chosen by the Russian team. The Ukrainians defeated the Russians 13-4 in this round.

Having chosen the Ancient map next, the Born to Win team got off to a shaky start as Virtus.pro took a 4-0 lead, but NAVI managed to narrow the gap, losing the first half of the map with a score of 5-7.

In the second half, the Ukrainian team achieved a 6-0 blitzkrieg thanks to outstanding play by Lithuanian Justinas "jL" Lekavičius. Virtus.pro kept them on their toes, reducing the gap to 12-11, but the Ukrainian team triumphed in the decisive round.

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The score was now 3-1 to NAVI.

NAVI’s victory secured them a place in the semifinals, where they will face the Norwegian team HEROIC (16).

IEM Rio 2024. Brazil

Prize pool: US$250,000

Quarter-finals, 11 October

Natus Vincere (Ukraine) – Virtus.pro 2-0 (13-4 Inferno, 13-11 Ancient)

IEM Rio 2024 is taking place from 7 to 13 October in Rio, Brazil. The winner of the tournament will receive US$100,000 and a ticket to IEM Katowice 2025.

Natus Vincere consists of two Ukrainians, a Lithuanian, a Romanian and a Finn:

  • Valerii "b1t" Vakhovskyi (Ukraine);
  • Justinas "jL" Lekavičius (Lithuania);
  • Aleksi "Aleksib" Virolainen (Finland);
  • Mihai "iM" Ivan (Romania);
  • Ihor "w0nderful" Zhdanov (Ukraine);
  • Andrii "B1ad3" Horodenskyi (coach, Ukraine).

Earlier, NAVI lost in the final of the prestigious BLAST Premier Fall Final 2024 tournament held in Denmark.

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