Spinx Clutch & Alliance Upset: BLAST Bounty Season 2 Day 1 Recap
MOUZ opened their BLAST Bounty Season 2 campaign with a 2-0 win over Nuclear TigeRES on July 21, marking a winning debut for 18-year-old Oldřich ‘PR’ Nový – though a mid-series scare on Nuke underlined that the result was not as clean as the scoreline suggests, with MOUZ needing a clutch intervention from Lotan ‘Spinx’ Giladi to avoid a deciding map.
Spinx Bails MOUZ Out on Nuke
MOUZ handled the first map comfortably, posting a dominant offensive showing on Ancient to take it convincingly. Nuke was a different story: Nuclear TigeRES read MOUZ’s attack well enough to push the favorites toward a potential decider before Spinx produced a Deagle three-kill that swung the round economy and allowed MOUZ to close it out. , and his debut result – however messy at points – delivers the winning start the org needed.
Elsewhere on day one, Astralis recovered from a shaky Nuke performance to reverse sweep Nemesis 1-2, with Jakob ‘jabbi’ Nygaard and Love ‘phzy’ Smidebrant delivering the firepower on Ancient and Cache respectively to put the match to bed. Ninjas in Pyjamas swept M80 2-0 – Inferno and Ancient – with Martin ‘stavn’ Lund leading the server and Kacper ‘xKacpersky’ Gabara locking down the CT side on the closer of the two maps.
Wildcard Hand Alliance a Reality Check
The day’s sole upset by VRS ranking saw Wildcard dismantle Alliance 2-0 across Inferno and Dust2. The result stings particularly for Alliance given they had just posted a top-four finish at XSE Pro League Guangzhou and arrived carrying a 13-map win streak on Inferno – a streak Wildcard snapped with a dominant showing despite Alliance’s Jonatan ‘bobeksde’ Persson grabbing a pistol ace in the second half of Dust2. It was the kind of form-check loss that raises real questions about whether Alliance’s Guangzhou run reflected genuine tier-one readiness.
BLAST Bounty’s format – where lower-ranked teams select their opponents – is designed to create exactly this kind of mismatch scenario, and the opening day largely played to type, with favorites largely prevailing on the opening day of the event with the only upset of the day (at least by VRS rank) being Wildcard vs Alliance.
Day Two: Falcons vs. 100 Thieves Headlines the Next Slate
Play resumes on July 22 with four matches confirmed. The marquee fixture is 100 Thieves vs. Falcons at 13:30, setting up Finn ‘karrigan’ Andersen against his former long-time FaZe teammate Håvard ‘rain’ Nygaard – now on 100 Thieves alongside Nicolai ‘device’ Reedtz. The tournament also features notable roster situations across the field worth tracking as the bracket takes shape.
Day Two schedule (July 22):
- EYEBALLERS vs. FaZe – 06:00
- Nemiga vs. G2 – 08:30
- HOTU vs. GamerLegion – 11:00
- 100 Thieves vs. Falcons – 13:30
Source: HLTV
