fnatic win MSI BEAT IT EU qual #1

fnatic have defeated ESC Gaming 2:0 in the final of MSI BEAT IT 2011 first European online qualifer, and have therefore joined the list of participants at DreamHack Winter 2011.

After fnatic and ESC Gaming won their semi-finals against Danish mix-teams, face and SKELETON-KINGZ respectively, they met in the final match of the qualifier.

First map was de_nuke where fnatic gained what seemed like an unreachable 13-2 lead on the Terrorist side. Even though ESC didn't want to give up, winning the second half pistol-round and starting to put some rounds on the board, fnatic slowly but surely clinched their 3 needed rounds for a 16-11 victory.

Second map was de_forge, one that neither of the teams has much experience with in official matches. Fnatic played it for the first time only a week ago as the deciding map of the final at IEM6 GC Guangzhou, when they overcame mousesports to win the event, while ESC Gaming is no better with only two matches recorded on the map against weaker German teams.

fnatic showed a similar CT-side performance as they did in China and won the first half 11-4. That was more than enough, as even though ESC won the following pistol round and the two anti-ecos, fnatic easily finished out the match 16-7.

MSI BEAT IT 2011 EU qualifier #1Best of 0 fnaticMatchpage 2 0 9th October 2011 ESC Gaming.se 16Nuke 11 16Forge 7

Thanks to this victory, fnatic have secured a spot in the $30,000 MSI BEAT IT 2011 tournament at DreamHack Winter, taking place in Jönköping, Sweden from November 24-27. In addition to the spot, fnatic will receive a $1,000 award for the first place.

The final tournament at DreamHack Winter will consist of 16 teams, and fnatic becomes the fourth one to qualify. The list of qualified teams contains these names for now:

SK Gaming	fnatic
Evil Geniuses	k1ck

With 12 teams left to add to the list, several more qualifiers like this one will be held, along with a few on LAN, most of which HLTV.org will cover, so make sure to stay tuned for more news about that.