Movistar Riders continue flawless run to reach grand final on home soil

The second semifinal of ESL Challenger Valencia 2022 has ended, with Movistar Riders beating Sprout in a two map series. They first dominated Inferno, which they won with a 16-5 scoreline, and then moved on to Nuke where they prevailed with a 16-11 scoreline to qualify for the grand final in their home event.

Movistar Riders will face Outsiders in the grand final later today, where they will hope to continue their run without losing a map and get the trophy in preparation for IEM Cologne.

Meanwhile Sprout are eliminated from the tournament and will switch their focus to their IEM Cologne campaign, where they will be facing Heroic in the first round of the Play-In stage.

The series kicked off on Inferno, where Movistar Riders had a good start, winning the pistol and going on a rampage as they were 10-0 up before Sprout was able to get their first round on the board. That was also the only round they won in the first half, with the halftime score standing at 14-1 in the favor of the Spaniards. Alejandro “⁠alex⁠” Masanet, who had a 2.11 rating in the two maps played in the event up to that point, was once again the star player, racking up 20 kills by halftime.

A pistol round win for Movistar Riders after a B rush got them up to 15-1, but Sprout were able to win the forcebuy and start their attempt to make the scoreline respectable. They were able to get only four rounds though, as another B rush with pistols got Movistar Riders the final round to close out the map 16-5.

Next up was Nuke, the pick of the Spaniards. They started off the second map where they ended the first by winning the pistol round, but a forcebuy led by Laurențiu “⁠lauNX⁠” Țârlea got Sprout back into the game as they got a 3-1 lead. They kept the lead through the opening exchanges, with lauNX once again proving crucial with a 1v2 clutch to put his team 8-4 up. The half ended with a fairly even 9-6 scoreline, as neither team was able to get a streak going.

A 3k in the pistol round by Alejandro “⁠mopoz⁠” Fernández-Quejo Cano got Movistar Riders within one round of their opponents, but the Spaniards weren’t able to win the first gun round, meaning Sprout went 11-8 up. That looked to have waken up the Spanish side and they didn’t lose a single round after that, going on an eight round streak to win the map 16-11 and book their place in the grand final.