The Astralis Talent team suffered their first defeat in the Upper-bracket final in European Pro League Season 7 against PROSPECTS.

We recently made changes to our CS:GO teams by switching Altekz and Xyp9x, which means that this is the Clutchminister's debut match for the talent squad.

The upper-bracket final began on PROSPECTS' map pick, Ancient. We went the first four rounds without a victory, but we responded by stringing together four rounds ourselves.

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Our in-game leader, Patti, showed the way by getting 15 frags and a 1.41 rating in the first half, which ended tight, 7-8. Despite winning the pistol round, PROSPECTS were too strong on the CT side, so we had a hard time winning consecutive rounds, which resulted in an 11-16 defeat.

It was now time for Overpass, a map with a 78.6% win rate and a five-map win streak after our 16-7 victory. It was a pure team effort in the first half, where four out of five players had between 11 and 12 frags.

Despite dominating the statistics, PROSPECTS won two rounds because of time running out and two clutches. The first half ended 8-7 in our favor, but there was no room for mistakes in the second half.

At least, that is what the players lived up to, winning eight consecutive rounds on the CT side. The even frag distribution continued as all players had between 18-19 frags in the end.

Talking about consecutive rounds - Anubis was the decider. We kept the round streak going from Overpass as we won the initial six rounds. PROSPECTS gained two rounds until we took three of our own, making the score 9-2.

PROSPECTS got the best of the remaining rounds in the half, making the score 9-6. Xyp9x was especially vital on our T-side, reaching 15 frags and a 1.72 rating.

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Unfortunately, we once again struggled with winning rounds back-to-back, which resulted in PROSPECTS taking the map victory 12-16.

We're still competing in the tournament, facing ENCE Academy tomorrow, Thursday, April 20, at 10:00 CEST in a consolidation final. The winner meets PROSPECTS in the Grand final.

Previously in the tournament, we beat ENCE Academy 2-1 in the opening round of playoffs.