One of the most prolific CS:GO players from North America ended his playing career last night in Dallas. Nicholas "nitr0" Cannella retired after Team Liquid was defeated 2-0 in the lower bracket of Group B against FaZe.

The match was decided on Anubis and Nuke, where FaZe dominated both maps. Russel "Twistzz" Van Dulken came close to ending nitr0’s career at 15-7 up, but his ninja defuse was denied by EliGE prompting nitr0 to write “not my final round”!

[twitchClip:SleepyExpensiveTermiteSquadGoals-nZGm43ns8kmJ2D9J]

Even though Team Liquid’s journey in Dallas was cut short before the playoffs, Nicholas "nitr0" Cannella can look back at an impressive career in two stints with Team Liquid. In his first tenure he won 11 notable trophies with the Intel Grand Slam Season 2 title as concrete evidence for one of the most remarkable performances in CS:GO history in 2019, where Liquid won the Grand Slam in just 63 days.

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Team Liquid has not yet announced who will be the new fifth member of the roster.

FaZe qualified for the Quarter-Finals with the win. Here they face G2 Friday night in Dallas.

nitr0

Team Liquid

Doing the BLAST Premier World Final 2022, the 27-year-old IGL Nicholas "nitr0" Cannella showed why he still got what it takes to play at the highest level. 

Doing a B execute from Outsiders, nitr0 plays well around his smoke to take down two players with the M4A4, switching to the AWP the IGL managed to kill another two to take the round win.

Check out this impressive B hold from nitr0 right here: 

On Thursday, Team Liquid secured a spot in the semi-finals of BLAST Premier Fall, following a 2-1 victory over NAVI with wins on Inferno (16-14) and Mirage (16-7), despite losing their opponents’ map pick of Dust2 (12-16).

Liquid’s North American IGL, Nick “nitr0” Cannella had some amazing performances in the match and stepped up for his team at crucial times. He even dropped his first 30 bomb in a few years.

nitr0 has made is way to our #POTD after delivering a wonderful quad-kill on Mirage, where he made sure to keep the defense of NAVI away from the B-bombsite.

Natus Vincere

An impressive display from Team Liquid’s in-game leader Nicholas "nitr0" Cannella saw the North Americans edge out NAVI in the Group B final at BLAST Fall Finals in Copenhagen.

On Inferno, it was a rare sight, as nitr0 went above and beyond what could be expected from the in-game leader who dropped 31 kills on the map that ended as close as it got with a 16-14 win for Liquid.

The excellent start to the match did not carry over to Dust2. Here NAVI outclassed Liquid, who woke up to late to spoil Perfecto’s birthday party on the map. The Russian was NAVI’s highest-rated player on his 23-year-old birthday.

But unluckily for him, another birthday party was launched on the other side of the server, where Keith "NAF" Markovic’s teammates began celebrating his 25-year-old birthday with a superb showing. Again it was “Captain America” himself leading the way for Liquid, who repeated their victory from the IEM Major against NAVI. A 16-7 win on Mirage qualifies Liquid directly for the Semi-Finals on Saturday in the Royal Arena and also locks in their spot at the Worlds Finals in December in Abu Dhabi.

NAVI will get another chance to qualify tomorrow when they face NIP tomorrow. 

Team Liquid - NAVI 2-1 | BLAST Premier Fall Finals

16-14 (Inferno) {cflag:US} nitr0 – 1.42 Rating / 31-19 K-D / 96.9 ADR

12-16 (Dust2) | {cflag:CA} NAF – 1.30 Rating / 21-17 K-D / 95.0 ADR

16-7 (Mirage) | {cflag:US} nitr0 – 1.51 Rating / 22-13 K-D / 96.6 ADR

MVP: Mareks "YEKINDAR" Gaļinskis – 1.25 Rating / 59-58 K-D / 86.7 ADR

We all know the jokes about North American CS:GO and how they are seemingly never able to compete with the European rosters within the professional CS:GO scene. Team Liquid during their incredible run back in 2018 and 2019 made sure to put every NA joke to shame as they went on to win the Intel Grand Slam with style. 

Since the golden days of Team Liquid, the North-American CS:GO scene has once again died down. This, however, might change once again if Team Liquid continues their recent form. Having just defeated the Danes of Heroic in the ongoing BLAST Premier Fall Groups 2022 event, spirits are high within the Team Liquid camp as they have secured qualification for the upcoming BLAST Premier Fall Finals event. 

We spoke with the IGL of Liquid "nitr0" just after the phenomenal victory against Heroic. When asked, not only about the team's performance but also about his own individual performance as of late, the American IGL said the following: 

To listen to the entire exclusive interview we did with "nitr0" you can watch the video posted down below: 

It started so well but ended with a brutal crash. The honeymoon for YEKINDAR and Team Liquid ended after only one map at IEM Cologne versus Team Spirit.

On Dust2 everything seemed right for the NA team, where the duo of nitr0 and YEKINDAR completely annihilated the defense of Spirit, who had to surrender their own map pick after an 11-4 lead to the NA team.

The stand-in, Mareks 'YEKINDAR' Gaļinskis, ended the map with a +14 K-D score, while Captain America himself, Nick 'nitr0' Cannella stole the show with an ADR of 110.5!

On Overpass it was a completely different story. At least for YEKINDAR. The Latvian star had a nightmare first half, where he did not manage to find a kill before the last round of the half! For Team Liquid the half ended with a nice recovery at 6-9 after being 2-8 down. Six T-side rounds on Overpass gave promises for a good second half, but Spirit and Robert 'Patsi' Isyanov wanted it different. A superb second half from the CIS roster pushed the match to a third map decider on Ancient.

Here Spirit won the knife round and kickstarted the map with a 10-5 lead on their CT side. A lead that was quickly equalized by the North Americans who found some of the pace and firepower back again as they had successfully utilized on Dust2. Combined with multiple opening kills going in the way of Liquid the map began to tip in favor of the NA team. But Team Spirit lingered on and kept themselves in the battle. And in double overtime, they managed to finally beat Team Liquid, who saw both the best and worst from their stand-in player today.

Spirit will play the winner of Faze vs 00Nation in the next round of IEM Cologne, while Team Liquid will face the loser.

Team Spirit - Team Liquid 2-1 | IEM Cologne

8-16 (Dust2) | {cflag:US} nitr0 - 1.72 Rating / 23-14 K-D / 110.5 ADR

16-9 (Overpass) | {cflag:RU} Patsi - 1.51 Rating / 27-17 K-D / 105.9 ADR

22-20 (Ancient) | {cflag:RU} Patsi - 1.20 Rating / 36-36 K-D / 91.8 ADR

MVP: {cflag:RU} Robert 'Patsi' Isyanov - 1.22 Rating / 80-74 K-D / 96.6 ADR

YEKINDAR

Patsi

Spirit

Liquid and paiN went head-to-head in the last match of the day at BLAST. The Brazilians ended up outlasting the North Americans after a long and hard-fought battle.

“hardzao” got his team off to a great start on their pick of Vertigo. They went up 4-0 on the T-side and were now in a great position. Liquid had a great run in the middle of the half led by a flourishing “NAF”, but after fifteen rounds it was the Brazilians who had the lead at 9-6.

The second half did not bring more fortune for the North Americans who only managed to secure three rounds after the break. paiN, who played an all-around solid team game, took Vertigo 16-9.

Even with the big loss on Vertigo, Liquid had not lost confidence, and they looked reinvigorated as they arrived on their pick of Ancient. 

On the hardest T-side in the map pool, Liquid, spearheaded by a soaring “oSee”, managed to take nine satisfying rounds before the break, leaving the Brazilians to play catch-up.

paiN, taking a page out of Liquid’s book, got off to a great start on the T-side and quickly secured their first lead of the map. But just as quickly as they found the advantage, they lost it again, and the North Americans secured their map pick and sent the match to a decider.

Overpass was selected as the final map of the series and paiN started it out with some of the magic they showed on Vertigo. After losing the pistol round, they forced their way to a 5-1 lead on the T-side. This is where the fun stopped for the Brazilians as they got run over in the last part of the half, and Liquid were up by three rounds at halftime.

After switching sides, Liquid quickly grew their lead to 12-6, and for the first time in the series “nitr0” and co. had a lead of more than five rounds. paiN, knowing that this is do-or-die, suddenly came alive and, led by “biguzera”, forced their way back into the game. The Brazilians hit match point but a quad-kill from “nitr0” sent the map into overtime.

paiN swept the CT-side and after failing to convert on two map points they finally managed to win on the third and are thereby moving on to the semi-finals.

Liquid - paiN 1-2 | BLAST Premier Spring Showdown 2022 NA

9-16 (Vertigo) | {cflag:CA} NAF - 1.52 Rating / 28-17 K-D / 118.8 ADR

16-13 (Ancient) | {cflag:US} oSee - 1.43 Rating / 28-19 K-D / 91.8 ADR

17-19 (Overpass) | {cflag:BR} biguzera - 1.59 Rating / 39-23 K-D / 109.4 ADR

MVP: {cflag:BR} Rodrigo "biguzera" Bittencourt - 1.35 Rating / 77-59 K-D / 89.7 ADR

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hardzao

oSee

biguzera

paiN

The highlight match this Wednesday is undoubtedly the battle between Heroic and Liquid at ESL Pro League Season 15. The two heavy hitters are set to go head-to-head in the fight for a prominent quarterfinal spot against the Swedes from NIP. 

Before that matchup, Astralis will kick off their playoff campaign by taking on Entropiq at 15:30 (CET). You can find today's most notable matches down below.

Astralis

Entropiq

Heroic

Nicholas "nitr0" Cannella is back in CS:GO after switching back from playing Valorant. At BLAST Premier Spring Groups the 26-year-old American struggled individually to deliver as Team Liquid failed to qualify for the Spring Finals.

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The transition back and forth from Valorant has given the Team Liquid in-game leader an interesting perspective on the two games.

- It is way easier to transition to Valorant... The swap back to CS after being away for a year and a half has been way harder than the swap from CS to Valorant. There are new players, new really good teams, and new things happening on the server. I think CS is harder, the Team Liquid in-game leader explained.

You can see the interview with Nicholas "nitr0" Cannella below.

In the world of Counter-Strike, the Intel Grand Slam is one of the most prestigious and greatest honors to obtain. The massive prize and title live up to its name, as the Intel Grand Slam offers no more than a whopping $1.000.000 in prize winnings.  The Intel Grand Slam was founded in 2017 by ESL and the prize is awarded to any team that manages to win four S-tier events held by ESL and DreamHack in a span of ten tournaments.

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In this article we’ll be taking a look at how the North American squad from Team Liquid stepped out of the shadow of Astralis and cemented their name in CS:GO history with an insane Intel Grand Slam in 2019 that capped off one of the most dominant runs CS:GO fans had ever seen.

Intel Grand Slam Season 2 | May 2019 – July 2019

Winners: Team Liquid (EliGE, Stewie2k, NAF, Twistzz, nitr0)

In 2018, the North American CS:GO roster made it to 5 grand finals, but lost all of them and watched the Danes from Astralis take on the first edition of Intel Grand Slam in the span of nine tournaments. Going into 2019, Team Liquid was looking for revenge.  

Team Liquid break their long-standing curse of second-place finishes

In 2018, the Danish CS:GO roster of Astralis established their hold on the competitive Counter-Strike scene with a historic run of tournament victories. They were unbeatable for much of their streak and nobody came close to them besides Team Liquid, who constantly finished directly behind them at events.

The North American CS:GO team had been nipping at the heels of the Danish CS:GO team Astralis during the year. And throughout the Danes’ Intel Grand Slam run, the team they faced and defeated in the finals, over and over again, was Team Liquid. The North Americans just couldn’t beat Astralis. If Team Liquid was a clear silver team, then Astralis was an even clearer gold team. But that was all until Team Liquid added Stewie2k to their lineup.

Rather than reaching out for an international player, they decided to bring in North America’s original savior. Stewie2k won the first Major title for NA when he led Cloud9 to a grand final victory against FaZe in Boston. He left Cloud9 to play for MIBR with one of the greatest players in coldzera, and now he was returning home to play with North America’s best CS:GO team.

With the Smoke Criminal on the roster, a superteam was finally assembled. All of Liquid’s players had renewed motivation and fire that Team Liquid had never experienced before. Right off the bat, 2019 opened with an upset as Team Liquid finally managed to secure a grand final victory over Astralis at iBUYPOWER Masters IV. This victory broke Liquid’s losing streak of five tournament finals and also their fifteen multi-map series losing streak they had since September 2017 when they had a different roster.  

After the iBUYPOWER Masters IV grand final victory over Astralis, Liquid’s new coach in AdreN credited their 2018 experience as a part of why they immediately found success in 2019.

However, as much as Team Liquid saw the tournament as a breakthrough, the rest of the CS:GO community wasn’t so sure. At the IEM Katowice Major 2019, Liquid and Astralis seemed destined to meet each other after an exciting Legends stage. But an underdog run from Aleksib and ENCE stopped the North American’s in the quarter-final. Instead, Astralis went on to secure the title, putting themselves in the drivers’ seat for the second season of the Intel Grand Slam.

The IEM Katowice Major was the only tournament in Season 2 of the Intel Grand Slam that Team Liquid let out of their grasp. After that, Liquid went on a tear. As the Danes from Astralis went for a Blast-only calendar, NA’s Team Liquid was dominating the tier 1 scene. Not a single one of the elite teams at the time (ENCE and Vitality) stood a chance against the unstoppable Team Liquid.

Starting off with IEM Sydney, Liquid was favored from the start. For many CS:GO fans, IEM Sydney seemed like an aberration due to the lack of top teams, but it ended up marking the beginning of Liquid’s dominance in the circuit. They made it to the grand final where they faced fnatic, a team that was good but not on the level of Liquid. The Swedish squad played their hearts out and brought the series so close that every fan wondered if Liquid would choke again. But they didn’t. Liquid secured a 3-2 series victory and would go on to electrify the world of CS:GO.

They won DreamHack Masters Dallas 2019 over the likes of ENCE and FaZe Clan, proving they were a level above everyone else within the top five teams. Then, they went on to eliminate Astralis in the quarter-finals at the ESL Pro League Season 9 Finals event, before demolishing G2 in the grand final to secure the title.

The North American CS:GO roster was winning so much that they realized they could win the Intel Grand Slam in record time.

By now, any notion of Team Liquid not being the strongest CS:GO team in the world was squashed, and their chance for an Intel Grand Slam title came clearly into view.

ESL One: Cologne 2019 was up next, and here Liquid had the perfect opportunity to cement their status as the best CS:GO team in the world and win an Intel Grand Slam. And they wouldn’t waste it as they won the event in their most convincing fashion yet. They took down NAVI, NRG Esports, and Vitality on their way to the title without dropping into the Lower Bracket.

Cologne had always been a place where history was made and for the first time in a long time, it was Liquid’s turn to make history by completing the Intel Grand Slam in just 63 days. This put Astralis’ achievement of winning the first season of the Intel Grand Slam in a completely different perspective.

Tomorrow we’ll take a look at NAVI’s journey to the Intel Grand Slam Season 3 title.

	30 days	90 days
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Today in CS:GO - Wednesday 6/4 - 2022

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