Team Vitality took on Team Liquid for the first game of BLAST Premier Fall Finals and made quick work of them in the series to secure a quick 2-0. Both the teams were termed as ‘dead teams’ by fans as both have announced that changes are coming. For Liquid, it’s the departure of Jake ‘Stewie2k’ Yip and Gabriel ‘FalleN’ Toledo while for Vitality it is Richard ‘shox’ Papillon and Jason ‘Kyojin’ Nguyen Van that will be leaving at the end of the year, it is rumoured.

In the second game it was Heroic, fresh off their PGL Major Semi Final run who took on FaZe Clan. Despite it being a 2-0, FaZe Clan kept it deathly close until the end. They were up 10-8 on Mirage and then 12-6 on Nuke but lost both the games in regulation with scores of 16-14 and 16-13.

It was apparent that Liquid weren’t really having the time of their lives and the atmosphere looked off, whereas Vitality were enjoying every second screaming and shouting in their possible ‘Last Dance’ tournament. Liquid had a 4-0 start on Mirage but quickly fell off as they lost the next 10 rounds in a row, only winning the final one as consolation. On the CT side too they had a good streak of 5 but Vitality looked comfortable as they won 16-10 from there on, without breaking a sweat, courtesy of ‘ZywOo’ and his 25 frags and 1.54 rating. 

Dust2 was a similar story as Liquid couldnt get 2 consecutive rounds in the first half. ‘ZywOo’ and ‘misutaaa’ took the reins this time and put up 11 for Vitality, with 18 and 17 kills in the half respectively. It was a formality in the second half as Vitality got the remaining 5 rounds, giving up just 3 to win 16-7.

Heroic kept it rather close with FaZe, with both the halves ending 8-7, albeit in Heroic’s favour both the times. It was ‘broky’ who carried FaZe in the first half, being the only player who went positive in K-D as he notched up 17 kills while the rest of FaZe was kept under check by ‘sjuush’ and ‘TeSeS’. The international roster did start the half with a lead of 10-8 but it was quickly cut down and then the teams traded rounds back and forth until the 30th as the Danes prevented OT to win in regulation.

Nuke looked like FaZe’s map pick going by eye test. They shut Heroic’s T side attacks with ease as they could only find 6 rounds. FaZe added the cherry on top by winning the pistol and were up 12-6.

A lost 3v2 in the 20th round saw the tide turn for Heroic as they put up round after round, going on a streak of 9 to complete the comeback and end the map 16-13.

G2 esports IGL, Nemanja ‘nexa’ Isakovic will be sitting out of what could be the last event of the calendar year, i.e. IEM Winter. The serbian has some visa issues that couldnt be sorted out in time and hence, he will have to step away from the $250,000 LAN. IEM Winter starts on Dec 2, a few days after the conclusion of BLAST Fall Finals.

His place will be taken by none other than veteran AWPer Kenny ‘kennyS’ Schrub. The french sniper who redefined how the AWP was used back in the day, has been on the bench since March after G2 decided to reinstate JaCkZ back to the roster. Since then he has been grinding it out on twitch.tv, streaming CS:GO, Valorant, hosting a watch party for the Major and a bunch of other games as well.

Fans welcomed this move as kenny has always been a fan favourite and they wanted to see him at the highest level, at least one more time. G2 will also play the BLAST World Finals at the end of the year, but currently it is unknown whether kennyS or nexa will feature in the squad. G2 recently parted ways with coach ‘maleK’ as well and his place would be taken up by ‘Swani’ for now.

G2 said in their statement that the Serb will be back in the lineup as soon as his issues are resolved. Till then the G2 esports roster will be:

• Nikola “⁠NiKo⁠” Kovač
• Nemanja “⁠huNter-⁠” Kovač
• Audric “⁠JaCkz⁠” Jug
• François “⁠AmaNEk⁠” Delaunay
• Kenny “⁠kennyS⁠” Schrub

• Jan “⁠Swani⁠” Müller (coach)

Brazilian CS:GO Pro, Marcelo ‘coldzera’ David said on his live stream that he will NOT be joining his former teammates for a supposed ‘Last Dance’. Coldzera was part of the Luminosity-SK core that won 2 back to back Majors in 2016. First it was MLG Columbus 2016 and then ESL ONE: Cologne the same year, to cement their position as one of the greatest rosters in CS:GO. 

During their most dominant run, the core of Fallen, fer and coldzera was the most feared trio in CS:GO, fallen with his deadly AWP and IGL-ing, fer with his relentless CT side aggression and coldzera with the ever-reliable clutching and anchoring ability. Coldzera won back to back Major MVP medals in both the majors his side won, and was the first one to have 2 Major MVPs to his name, which was later equalled by Nicolai ‘dev1ce’ Reedtz of Astralis (Currently NiP).

In late 2019, coldzera transferred to FaZe Clan to play alongside his friend Nikola ‘NiKo’ Kovac. It was his first international team and he started off well with a BLAST Pro Series win in Copenhagen 2019. But that would be the only trophy he would get with them. He was subsequently benched in the second half of 2021, after NiKo left and karrigan rejoined FaZe. He had a brief stint standing in with Complexity for 2 months but that didnt amount to anything.

It was rumored by Jaxon that the SK core would reunite for one last time, but coldzera has denied the rumours. On his live stream he said that he moved from Serbia to Portugal and hopes to play on a tier 1 team again which is why he will stay in Europe. 

It is still possible that the reunion might happen, with rumours of Liquid changing their roster it is likely that fallen, fer and fnx may still reunite without coldzera but that remains to be seen.