BLAST Showdown Amercas and Europe kicks off today

Several top 10 teams are in action at BLAST Premier Fall Showdown that takes place this week. The tournament is split between the Americas and Europe. The matches will be played on CS:GO, which will probably be the last time in history we will see Tier-1 teams in action in CS:GO.

In Europe, these teams fight for one spot to the Fall Finals in Copenhagen later this year.

G2, ENCE, Cloud9, BIG, 9INE, Alliance, Movistar Riders, and OG.

In the Americas, we have the following teams fighting for a spot.

Team Liquid, Complexity, FURIA, Evil Geniuses, Imperial, Party Astronauts, Forsaken, Legacy

Team news before BLAST Showdown:

Team Liquid has confirmed the rumors of benching Aleks "⁠Rainwaker⁠" Petrov. The team will use their coach Damian "⁠daps⁠" Steele for the upcoming event. It's been 18 months since "daps" played a competitive CS:GO match. Aleks "⁠Rainwaker⁠" Petrov only played 34 maps during the three-month stint at Liquid.

Imperial will play the tournament with Lucas "⁠LUCAS1⁠" Teles, who has taken the place of Jhonatan "⁠JOTA⁠" Willian, who was benched after a disappointing run at the ESL Pro League. Kaiky "⁠noway⁠" Santos is rumored to be the new permanent fifth of the team after the conclusion of the BLAST Showdown.

Both Party Astronauts and Alliance are in the tournament despite not having qualified. The North Americans from Party Astronauts were invited due to visa issues for TheMongolz. The second in line to be called up for the tournament was 5yclone, but due to the late notice, they were not able to secure visas either. In the case of Alliance, the Swedes were called up due to the disqualification of Victory Zigzag, who had one of their players Joel "⁠joel⁠" Holmlund accused of match-fixing by ESIC, while their coach Ivan "⁠Hardwell⁠" Alekseev got banned shortly after by FACEIT due to cheating.

Talents for BLAST Showdown:

Some new fresh names have been given a chance to shine at the qualification tournament. Lucas "Bubzkji" Andersen, former Astralis player, will get the chance as an analyst alongside his countryman and former Major MVP winner Markus "Kjaerbye" Kjærbye. The two Danes will be on the desk with Jacob "Pimp" Winneche, and Mathieu "Maniac" Quiquerez who will take on the role as a coach.

In the caster role, we find BLAST's two main commentators in Conner "Scrawny" Girvan and Mohan "launders" Govindasamy, who will be joined by Jason "moses" O'Toole and Adam "Dinko" Hawthorne. James Banks will be the interviewer at the event.

Schedule for BLAST Showdown:

The tournament will be played as a single elimination bracket with best of three matches. Here is the schedule.

Wednesday 4/10: (Times in CEST)

15.00: 9INE - BIG (Europe)
18.00: ENCE - Alliance (Europe)
20.00: Imperial - Party Astronauts (Americas)

Thursday 5/10:

15.00: Cloud9 - Movistar Riders
18.00: G2 - OG
20.00: Liquid - Forsaken

Friday 6/10:

15.00: Semi-Final 1 (Europe)
18.00: Complexity - Evil Genius (Americas)
20.00: FURIA - Legacy (Americas)

Saturday 7/10:

15.00: Semi-Final 2 (Europe)
18.00: Semi-Final 1 (Americas)
20.00: Semi-Final 2 (Americas)

Sunday 8/10:

18.00: Grand Final (Europe)
20.00: Grand Final (Americas)

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