BLAST Premier Global Finals recently ended with an amazing face-off between Na’Vi and Astralis, a fine for Team Vitality, and amazing performances from all kinds of professional players. Today we’ll be going over some of the highlights, out comes, and what else is coming for the world of CS:GO esports.
RESULTS
The first day of the finals we saw Astralis swiftly shut down Evil Geniuses followed by G2’s smackdown of Furia. Day two was when things really got interesting though. Aside from Evil Geniuses beating G2 and Vitality beating complexity, we also got to be surprised when Team Liquid sent Na’Vi straight to the losers’ bracket. In the Liquid v. Na’Vi game, we got to see great performances by all players involved; however, Team Liquids recent addition of FalleN seems to have paid off. The third day saw Complexity v. Navi (1-2), Astralis v. G2 (2-1), and Vitality v. Team Liquid (2-0). On the fourth day it was Evil Geniuses v. Team Liquid (1-2) and Na’Vi v. G2 (2-0). The fifth day brought us Astralis v. Vitality (2-1) and Na’Vi v. Team Liquid (2-0). Finally, on the sixth day we first got to Na’Vi defend their chance at the finals against Vitality followed up by the mind-blowing grand final featuring Astralis v. Navi. In that game spectators were somewhat surprised when the #1 team in the world was swiftly and deftly put in their new place by team Na’Vi.
Interesting Things that Happened at BLAST
Despite the the surprising victory of Na’Vi after such a swift and early defeat, the real show stopper was the news and controversy surrounding Team Vitality after sending Team Liquid to the lower bracket. The Esports Integrity Commission issued a fine to Team Vitality who were found to be stream sniping. The ESIC said no malicious intent was suspect but their zero tolerance policy mandated reprimand.
ESIC issues $10,000 fine to team Vitality in response to stream-sniping breach of the ESIC Code.
While there was no malicious intention detected by ESIC in its examination of evidence, ESIC’s zero tolerance approach mandates accountability from the organisation for the breach. pic.twitter.com/Gs7Kwut0le
— ESIC (@ESIC_Official) January 23, 2021
Finally, we got to see FalleN first big tournament with Team Liquid — check out our piece covering team Liquid on their way IEM Global. His performance in BLAST has reaffirmed our hopes that FalleN would bring the focus and direction that Team Liquid seem to have so desperately needed.
With the end of BLAST, followers of CS:GO esports still have IEM Katowice 2021 to look forward to. IEM starts on Feb. 18th, 2021 — just a couple weeks away.
