The first edition of the Fantasyexpo Cup starts on March 23. Over the next three days, a winner will be selected who will advance to the BLAST Premier Spring Showdown 2021.
The Fantasyexpo Cup is part of the tournament series that aims to select the participants of the upcoming BLAST Premier Spring Showdown 2021. The event organized by the Polish agency Fantasyexpo focuses on the countries of Western Europe, for years being a key part of the Counter-Strike scene.
The past two weeks have been marked by regional qualifying tournaments that have identified five participants in the Fantasyexpo Cup. During this time, the best teams from the regions of DACH, France, Poland and Great Britain were selected and the open last-chance qualifications were carried out. The winners joined the previously invited mousesports, FunPlus Phoenix and MAD DOG’S PACT and divided into two groups, which are as follows:
| Group A mousesports MAD DOG’S PACT Sprout DBL Poney | Group B FunPlus Phoenix Pump Team Endpoint Team LDLC |
Participants will play the group stage according to the GSL format. Group stage matches will be best-of-one matches, and all subsequent matches up to the finals will be best-of-three matches. One of the best teams will advance to the BLAST Premier Spring Showdown and receive a participation fee of $25,000 in the process. That amount is provided by BLAST Premier for the development of the organization.
The Fantasyexpo Cup will be held on March 23-25 and will be available at https://www.twitch.tv/blastpremier
| 23.03 Group A | 24.03 Group B | 25.03 – Playoffs |
| Match 1 – 17:00 Mousesports vs DBL Poney Match 2 – 18:15 Sprout vs PACT Match 3 – 19:30 Winner M1 vs Winner M2 Match 4 – 20:45 Loser M1 vs Loser M2 Match 5 Loser M3 vs Winner M4 | Match 1 – 17: 00 FPF vs Team LDLC Match 2 – 18:15 Endpoint vs Pompa Team Match 3 – 19:30 Winner M1 vs Winner M2 Match 4 – 20:45 Loser M1 vs Loser M2 Match 5 Loser M3 vs Winner M4 | Semifinal 1 – 15:30 Semifinal 2 – 18:00 Final – 21:00 |
The highest-ranked team from the entire stake is FunPlus Phoenix, which holds a record 15th place in the HLTV ranking in its history. mousesports and Sprout are another two teams that can be found in the list of the 30 best teams in the world. The other participants are placed lower, and for the Pump Team players it will be the first such a large international tournament in their career. Their promotion is best illustrated by the common goal of the BLAST and Fantasyexpo organizations, which for years have been trying to develop esports structures beyond the world’s top.
