The Danish squad secured a commanding win on Ancient, while Spirit, G2, and Monte also picked up opening victories in Germany.
The second stage of the IEM Cologne Major 2026 is officially underway, with the first eight best-of-one matches wrapping up on Saturday.
Astralis delivered the most decisive result of the opening round. The Danish lineup dismantled GamerLegion 13-4 on Ancient, taking early control of the match and never letting their opponents find solid footing. The victory puts Astralis in the 1-0 bracket heading into round two.
A busy day on Mirage
Mirage was the clear map of choice for the majority of the opening matchups, hosting four of the first seven games. Team Spirit secured a convincing 13-5 victory over BetBoom on the map to start their tournament run with a strong performance.
G2 and Monte both posted identical 13-8 scorelines on Mirage. G2 defeated the North American side M80, while Monte claimed their win against the German organization BIG.
TYLOO continued their momentum from the previous stage, overcoming paiN Gaming 13-9 to start their stage 2 campaign on a positive note.
Close battles on Ancient and Dust2
FUT Esports and B8 played out one of the most competitive maps of the round. FUT managed to edge out a 13-11 win on Ancient, securing the final rounds in regulation to avoid overtime.
On Dust2, 9z took down FlyQuest 13-9. The South American squad maintained a steady economic advantage throughout the second half to close out the map.
The final match of the first round saw Legacy fight MIBR in a Brazilian derby. On Nuke it was MIBR’s Russian AWP’er Klimentii “kl1m” Krivosheev that made the difference for MIBR, who took a surprising win 13-8 to close of the first round.
Round 2 schedule:
We will update here with the schedule for round 2 as soon as it is announced. These are the matchups: (Times in CEST)
17.30: Astralis – 9z
17.30: FUT – TYLOO
18.30: Legacy – FlyQuest
18.30: G2 – Monte
19.30: paiN – BIG
19.30: B8 – M80
20.30: Spirit – MIBR
20.30: BetBoom – GamerLegion
