In the final match of IEM Cologne, which lasted more than six hours, FaZe defeated Natus Vincere in a hard-fought battle. In order to determine the winner, the opponents had to play all five maps – Inferno, Overpass, Ancient, Mirage and Nuke – and the match was full of memorable moments performed by players from both teams.
On the first two maps, the teams' strengths looked almost equal: one or the other of them got an advantage of one or two points. As a result Inferno stayed behind FaZe (16 – 13), and the next card was taken by NAVI with the same score difference. On Ancient Natus Vincere managed to take the lead with a significant advantage: at one point the score was 15 – 5. However, NAVI then failed to take the decisive round for a long time and allowed FaZe to tie the game and take it to overtime. NAVI won this map, but only with a score of 19 – 16.
Mirage again remained for FaZe, and with a more noticeable advantage in its favor (9 – 16). Thus, the fate of the match was decided on Nuke, and for most of the time the teams were pretty much evenly matched. In the last rounds FaZe managed to get ahead and won the map, and with it the whole match, with a minimal advantage (14 – 16).
Thus, having taken the first place at IEM Cologne, FaZe gets the main prize of 400 thousand dollars, and also returns the leading position in the world ranking. The second place in the tournament and the prize of 180 thousand goes to Natus Vincere, and the third and fourth places were shared by Movistar Riders and Astralis.