In the most recent major, DreamHack Cluj-Napoca, Fnatic faced the Brazilian lineup of Luminosity Gaming. Starting on the Terrorist side, Fnatic perform an adaption of the classic 'B-split', where some players attack B-site through Banana, and the rest of the team go through CT Spawn. Spoilers - Fnatic won the pistol round, fairly convincingly. Here, I'll break down each of the features of the execute and their effectiveness and impact on the round.

First, let's take a look at a map of de_inferno. This may look a little confusing, but if you've played Inferno it will be easily recognisable. Now, Fnatic's focus is the B-site. As you can see, there are two clear routes to the B-site (excuse the garish arrows):

This is the underlying concept of the 'B-split'. The Terrorists divide their forces, some through Banana and some through CT Spawn, in order to make holding the bombsite more difficult for the Counter Terrorists due to the amount of angles they'll have to defend from. At a high level of Counter-Strike, teams will often have a player positioned in CT Spawn to counter this specific strategy, however they can usually be overwhelmed due to the numerous terrorists attacking them.

Before the round begins, the Terrorists have to buy. If you're performing a B-split, generally the Terrorists will want to buy two smoke grenades to smoke off Library and Short/Quad, which will stop the Counter Terrorists from having a clear line of sight to the terrorists as they approach Arch, as well as stopping them from establishing a crossfire at Arch as the Terrorists enter into CT spawn and then through to B. The same players may also want to buy some other grenades - generally a flashbang or two to aid a push into the bombsite, or maybe a High Explosive (HE) grenade to finish off an enemy or just cause some good damage. The rest of the Terrorists will normally buy kevlar. Here's a good example of the kind of buy I'm talking about:

As you can see here, seized is the utility man, whilst the rest of his team have the aforementioned kevlar. A B-Split can still be pulled off with one smoke, and is normally used to smoke off the Library player to stop that crossfire from forming.

Taking a look at Fnatic's buy, you can see there are some differences:

First of all, Olofmeister has a buy often referred to by the community as a 'Raid Boss' (a Borderlands reference) - he purchases kevlar, and a teammate (in this case KRiMZ) drops him a Tec-9. This means he has a big advantage over the enemy as he can survive aimpunch AND have a more powerful weapon - he is designed to frag and cause massive damage. Olof is chosen due to his position as the main star player in Fnatic; he is one of the most capable and effective players on his team. Other star player Flusha is similarly tanked up, having Pronax's P250 and his own armour. Pronax is the utility man here, spending the rest of his money on a smoke and a flashbang. KRiMZ does not purchase anything else in order to keep his money levels similar to his team's, and JW buys the standard kevlar vest.

So we know the buy is different, but how about the execute?

The first thing that happens straight off the bat is the players get into positions ready for the execute. Fnatic's execute relies on Luminosity peeforming a 'standard' setup, with two players defending B and three players defending A, with one of these players playing near or in CT Spawn. Initially, Flusha goes alone into Banana, while the rest of his team heads in the direction of Apartments. It is notable that all players are walking rather than running, to make sure that Luminosity have as little information as possible on their whereabouts.

Flusha then gets a pick on a player in Banana. This instantly weakens the B-site, which now has just one player defending it. As Flusha is alone, this obviously does not cause any form of rotation from the Counter Terrorists, as they are inclined to believe the majority of the Terrorists (as well as the bomb) are towards A-site. However this does make the Arch-side player back off more towards CT Spawn for a quick rotate, in-case more players are seen at B.

As Fnatic got a quick kill at B, and acting on the knowledge that the B-site is likely to have just one Counter Terrorist on it therefore, they quickly perform the execute as soon as possible in order to catch the enemy off-guard before they have a chance to rotate and/or reposition. JW is playing in Middle, and calls to his team that the top of Middle is smoked off. Once this smoke clears, the execute begins. Pronax throws his smoke grenade off the edge of the doorframe in Boiler, to smoke off Short/Quad. Pronax, Olofmeister and KRiMZ are all in Apartments, and leave through Boiler to push up to Arch, alongside JW who comes up through Middle.

In terms of individual play, there are also some interesting elements. JW prefires and then spams the player on Arch-side in order to make them fall back. KRiMZ and Olofmeister spam through Pronax's smoke, which not only potentially tags up the other players playing A, but also makes them consider it could be an A-site execute. To avoid the spam, the player playing on Quad-side falls back to a more passive position on the bombsite in Pit. The next part of the execute is what makes it most successful. As only one smoke has been used, to smoke off Short/Quad, Luminosity are not under the impression that Fnatic are performing a B-split until it's already underway, instead thinking it will be an A-site take by wrapping around by Library, which is another common execute. The Counter Terrorists who fell back to Pit and Balcony are now out of position to deal with the sudden push into CT Spawn. This means the player who fell back to Arch/CT Spawn now has to take on 4 players. He manages to kill Pronax, but is traded out, making the situation a 4v3 in favour of the Terrorists. This is now the situation that the round is in:

As you can see, the two dedicated players on A are way out of position to deal with the push, and due to both the early pick in Banana and the Arch-side player being traded out, there is just one Counter Terrorist left to defend the B bombsite. He soon goes down to Olofmeister's Tec-9. It is also notable that throughout this entire execute, Flusha has been holding position in Banana. This is important as it maintains map control for the Terrorists, as well as misleading Luminosity by thinking there aren't many enemies towards the B-site. Flusha's role in the execute, apart from holding position, appears to have been to possibly pick the last player on B (however Olofmeister gets the kill) as well as to hold the bombsite, moving in as the rest of his team arrive from CT Spawn - thus completing the split.

Once the final player on B is killed, this is essentially where the round is won. However the round is secured post-plant due to a few features.

One is that while the rest of his team accompany the bomb to the site, Olofmeister stays in CT Spawn. This is very important for two reasons. One reason is that he can pick (or at least do significant damage to) any rotators that come through CT Spawn, due to his 'Raid Boss' setup. The other reason is that he can continuously pressure any Counter Terrorists that are trying to retake the site from CT Spawn, as well as relay their position to his team. He maintains this pressure by continually not committing to a fight with the Counter Terrorist, so that the player there cannot attempt a retake of the site effectively, due to constantly having to worry about being shot in the back at any moment. This delays the retake and so makes it less likely to be successful, as well as lowering the chances that the Counter Terrorists will have time to defuse the bomb.

The other main feature which secures the round for Fnatic is the role of Flusha and JW. Whilst Flusha holds a position at the back of the bombsite, JW plays a similar role to Olofmeister and pressures the other Counter Terrorist coming from Banana. He again does not commit to any fights or aim duels; merely shooting, hiding and repositioning, making a retake the site more difficult and confusing. By distracting the last two remaining Counter Terrorists, it makes it much more difficult for the pair to communicate and coordinate a retake together, as well as delaying them as mentioned before. Flusha does actually find both kills in the end, peeking from Quad box at the back of site to first pick off the CT Spawn player, and then the Banana player. Here's another graphic to make this easier to digest:

Overall, it ensures Fnatic a good start to their T-side, winning convincingly with three players remaining. Now all this information may be difficult to fully process, so it's a good idea to watch the round as well. Here's a YouTube link to the first round (large video; warning for data capped readers). Try to piece together the various features of the execute and the key turning points of the round. All of the aspects outlined above take place very quickly, but should be easy to understand. The casters also notice some of the features of the round I described above as well.

This execute would be a good strategy to use in a 5-man, as it's a little unorthodox and if pulled off well could really catch the Counter Terrorists off guard. However I wouldn't recommend it in Matchmaking unless you are queued with a decent number of friends or are with very compliant teammates with good communication. You don't have to copy the strategy exactly like Fnatic; consider adapting it to create your own version. For example, you could have two players in Banana or maybe have a more standard buy with glocks, grenades and kevlar rather than the 'Raid Boss' buy. Hopefully this round now makes more sense and gives you some ideas for winning pistol rounds in the future.

Are you into fantasy leagues? Then check out AlphaDraft and put together your allstar lineup!