IEM Cologne 2023: Heroic and ENCE are the first to make to the Cathedral

Halfway through the group stage of IEM Cologne 2023, Heroic and ENCE are the first teams to make to the Cathedral of CS:GO: LANXESS Arena. The Europeans won their first two matches and are guaranteed in the playoffs of the tournament.

After surviving a scare against underdogs The MongolZ on the first day, Heroic won in a close matchup against Monte. ENCE, the other team qualified, suffered to win against 9INE, but beat Fnatic without any scare to make it to LANXESS Arena.

Now, Heroic and ENCE will face each other next Tuesday, August 1, to see who will get the upper hand in the playoffs. The team that wins this match will qualify directly for the semifinals of IEM Cologne 2023. The loser starts the competition in the quarterfinals.

The MongolZ and 9INE said goodbye to Cologne

Besides the first two qualified to the playoffs, IEM Cologne 2023 also met the first teams eliminated from the group stage. The MongolZ and 9INE lost their second match in this stage and said goodbye to Cologne.

The Mongolian squad had a chance to start well against Heroic. After winning the first map The MongolZ had a match point in the second one, but didn't close when they had the chance. After that, Heroic completed a comeback in Overpass and closed the deal in Inferno.

In today's match, once again The Mongolz had the chance to win with a match point in the third map, Overpass. But, like what happened with Heroic, GamerLegion took the game to overtime and completed the comeback to eliminate the Asians.

For 9INE, the story was similar. In the first match, against ENCE, the Polish squad had a chance to win but allowed an overtime and a comeback in the last map. In the battle against Cloud9, once more they had the chance to close the match, but the Russians took the game to overtime in the last map and completed the comeback to eliminate 9INE.