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The first two teams to secure their spots in the ESL One New York 2019 Europe Closed Qualifier have been found as Sprout and Valiance finished top two in the open qualifier.

As the first ESL One New York open qualifier in Europe came down to the final 16 teams, the likes of Aristocracy, Winstrike, Tricked, and Nordavind were in contention. However, it was Sprout and OpTic—who were playing with René "⁠TeSeS⁠" Madsen instead of Marco "⁠Snappi⁠" Pfeiffer—that made it to one of the semi-finals.

The match that decided who would advance to the closed qualifier was played as a BO3, starting on Mirage. The German team managed to claim a 16-12 victory on their map pick as Josef "⁠faveN⁠" Baumann stood out with a 1.43 rating, but OpTic struck back on Nuke, 16-13, after a dominant CT side spearheaded by Ismail "⁠refrezh⁠" Ali's 31 kills.

It all came down to Dust2 where Mathias "⁠MSL⁠" Lauridsen's squad started well as CT, 6-2. Sprout then turned things around, finishing the half just one round behind and took the lead with a confident start to their CT side. In the end, the efforts of Timo "⁠Spiidi⁠" Richter and Florian "⁠syrsoN⁠" Rische were enough for their victory, 2-1 for the series.

Sprout	K - D	+/-	ADR	Rating 2.0
Timo 'Spiidi' RichterSpiidi	68 - 51	+17	96.3	1.37
Florian 'syrsoN' RischesyrsoN	62 - 51	+11	73.2	1.19
Sabit 'mirbit' Coktasarmirbit	48 - 50	-2	72.4	1.04
Josef 'faveN' BaumannfaveN	54 - 52	+2	65.7	1.03
Nils 'k1to' Gruhnek1to	54 - 52	+2	70.0	1.01

OpTic	K - D	+/-	ADR	Rating 2.0
Kristian 'k0nfig' Wieneckek0nfig	60 - 60	0	81.8	1.07
Nikolaj 'niko' Kristensenniko	55 - 55	0	80.6	1.07
Mathias 'MSL' LauridsenMSL	52 - 57	-5	61.0	0.92
Ismail 'refrezh' Alirefrezh	49 - 55	-6	61.2	0.85
René 'TeSeS' MadsenTeSeS	40 - 60	-20	54.0	0.73

On the other side of the bracket, Valiance defeated BLUEJAYS and Aristocracy before taking on Salamander for the closed qualifier spot. The Hungarian side opted for Mirage to kick off the series, but had a slow start and managed just five T rounds. A CT pistol win gave hope of a comeback in the second half, but Nemanja "⁠nexa⁠" Isaković and co. closed out the map swiftly, 16-7.

Nuke was more contested, largely thanks to Salamander starting it with a 4-0 lead on the CT side. The Serbian team then broke their opponents economy and capitalized on it to take a 9-6 lead going into the favored side of the map. The second pistol went the way of the Hungarian team who shortly equalized the scoreline, but once again didn't match up to Valiance in the buy rounds, who closed out the game, 16-12, after Rokas "⁠EspiranTo⁠" Milasauskas's quad kill.

Salamander	K - D	+/-	ADR	Rating 2.0
Patrik 'bodito' Bodabodito	43 - 36	+7	88.6	1.24
Viktor 'flashie' Tamás Beaflashie	40 - 35	+5	86.1	1.09
Renátó 'bzt' Bárányosbzt	27 - 38	-11	54.1	0.69
Áron 'Aaron' HomokiAaron	19 - 42	-23	55.6	0.67
András 'coolio' Fercsákcoolio	19 - 43	-24	47.5	0.52

Valiance	K - D	+/-	ADR	Rating 2.0
Nemanja 'huNter-' KovačhuNter-	51 - 30	+21	95.4	1.55
Rokas 'EspiranTo' MilasauskasEspiranTo	48 - 30	+18	101.7	1.51
Nemanja 'nexa' Isakovićnexa	34 - 32	+2	75.2	1.17
Otto 'ottoNd' SihvoottoNd	31 - 26	+5	62.7	1.11
Nestor 'LETN1' TanićLETN1	30 - 31	-1	63.9	0.96

A total of eight teams will participate in the ESL One New York Closed Qualifier, scheduled for July 9th. Two more will be decided through an open qualifier, while the last four are reserved for invites:

ESL One New York is still three and a half months away, set for September 26-29, with $200,000 on offer. Currently, the only squad confirmed for the eight-team event is Astralis.