mousesports defeat Liquid to win ESG Tour Mykonos
Liquid and mousesports reached the Grand Finals of ESG Tour Mykonos with surprising wins over SK and Virtus.pro, respectively. These upset victories set the stage for a best of five series between the North American and European squads, to see who would earn the right to hoist the first ESG Tour trophy, as well as abscond with the majority of the prize money on offer.
The first map of the five game series was Cobblestone, which both teams had found success on previously in Mykonos. mousesports lept out to a 5-1 lead before a technical issue caused a prolonged pause. After this, Liquid won some much needed rounds and brought the score back to 5-7. The Europeans of mousesports ultimately finished the half with 9 rounds in their favor. Liquid were hardly able to do anything on their Terrorist side, which saw them throw away a B hold which looked to be a guaranteed win. The final insult for the North Americans came at 15-8 when they had forced mousesports onto an eco, possessing only an AWP in the hands of Tomáš "oskar" Šťastný – which was quickly removed by Peter "stanislaw" Jarguz. However, Martin "STYKO" Styk had other plans, he played around a smoke by B stairs to grab one kill, then got another with the dropped AWP, securing the map for mousesports.
Liquid did not looked fazed at all once the map switched over to Inferno, their pick. The Americans won the opening pistol and converted the two following rounds before mousesports busted off a three round streak of their own. That would the largest amount of sustained success for the European team, as they would win only one further round in the half. Liquid won the second half pistol as well, and quickly closed out the map with a score of 16-5.
Liquid looked as if they would maintain the pace on Train, taking the opening pistol. However they immediately surrendered the lead to a mousesports eco round. Liquid would eventually wrest control of a back and forth half, finishing it 9-6 in their favor. Undaunted, mousesports won their Counter-Terrorist pistol, and did not stop winning until the map was theirs, not dropping a single round on that side. As on Cobblestone, STYKO was particularly important to this map win.
Once again placed on the back foot, Liquid rattled off 8 round wins on Mirage before succumbing to the CT defense of mousesports. The half would end 11-4 in favor of the North Americans, and despite the slight comeback from mousesports at the end, it was decidedly theirs. mousesports would take their Terrorist pistol, and eventually amass 13 rounds (making this the closest map of the set), but ultimately fell to the Liquid defense.
The final map of the series was Nuke, and mousesports got off to a blistering start on the Counter-Terrorist side, winning nine rounds before Liquid was able to take one, in part due to a double kill from in-game leader stanislaw. Liquid were able to muster four rounds on their Terrorist side, but they would accumulate no more after mousesports won the second half pistol. On a map where the North America team simply had no answers for oskar, who posted a monstrous 30-6 and 2.38 rating, they never had a chance of lifting the Mykonos trophy.
MOUZLiquid| MOUZ |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Tomáš 'oskar' Šťastný |
92 - 67 | +25 | 75.9 | 72.3% | 1.20 |
 Miikka 'suNny' Kemppi |
95 - 81 | +14 | 83.3 | 68.9% | 1.19 |
 Martin 'STYKO' Styk |
84 - 79 | +5 | 80.7 | 69.7% | 1.09 |
 Chris 'chrisJ' de Jong |
69 - 83 | -14 | 71.4 | 69.7% | 1.04 |
 Robin 'ropz' Kool |
72 - 70 | +2 | 64.7 | 70.6% | 1.01 |
| Liquid |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 2.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Josh 'jdm64' Marzano |
87 - 76 | +11 | 77.6 | 70.6% | 1.10 |
 Peter 'stanislaw' Jarguz |
85 - 87 | -2 | 84.2 | 63.0% | 1.03 |
| Jonathan 'EliGE' Jablonowski |
80 - 84 | -4 | 72.8 | 67.2% | 1.01 |
| Russel 'Twistzz' Van Dulken |
67 - 80 | -13 | 58.2 | 71.4% | 0.88 |
| Nick 'nitr0' Cannella |
60 - 85 | -25 | 61.3 | 65.5% | 0.87 |
A small bit of good news for Liquid is that they, along with champions mousesports and third place finishers SK, will receive automatic invites to the next ESG Tour event. The location and timing for this event is currently unknown, though it is expected to be revealed in the coming weeks.
The final placings of ESG Tour Mykonos are as follows:
1. 
mousesports - $117,500 + next ESG Tour event
2. Liquid - $47,00 + next ESG Tour event
3. 
SK - $23,500 + next ESG Tour event
4. 
Virtus.pro - $23,500
5-6. 
Gambit - $5,875
5-6. 
BIG - $5,875
7-8. 
EnVyUs - $5,875
7-8. 
Heroic - $5,875
