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The year’s best-performing CS2 teams are all gearing up for one final big showdown before the Shanghai Major, with the prestigious BLAST Premier World Final and its million-dollar prize pool offering another opportunity for the Counter-Strike elite to strike out on an era-defining run. Could we see a first-time repeat winner, or will another upstart go on a G2-like underdog run to win it all?
Here’s everything you need to know about the 2024 BLAST World Finals, including the schedule and the tournament format, the list of the participating teams and players, the storylines you should be on the lookout for, and, of course, the various betting odds involved that you will want to familiarize yourself with.
The BLAST Premier World Final uses an identical format this year to what we have seen in 2023 and 2022: two groups of four teams play out a GSL-style double elimination bracket, with the group winners seeded directly into the semifinals of the playoffs stage. The runner-up of each group plays the third-place finisher of the other one in the quarterfinals.
Every match is a best-of-three affair, and the grand final is a whopping best-of-five. The winner will take home $500,000 of the million-dollar prize pool.
The 2024 BLAST Premier World Final will take place in Sentosa, Singapore, with the Resorts World Convention Centre serving as the venue for the tournament. The tournament begins on October 30, and it will conclude on November 3. October 30 and 31 will feature all group stage matches, and there is no rest day scheduled before the playoffs.
The previous winners of the BLAST Premier World Final are Team Vitality (2023), G2 (2022), and NAVI (2021). NAVI have also won the 2020 season finale, which was then called the Global Final, and it took place entirely online due to the pandemic situation.
The BLAST Premier World Final is the annual conclusion of the year’s BLAST circuit events, featuring the eight best-performing teams of the world battling it out for their share of the $1 million prize pool. Teams can secure their invitations for the tournament in the following ways:
The number of leaderboard spots available depends on how many teams have qualified via the other pathways. Teams earn leaderboard points by playing in the most prestigious events of the third-party circuit, meaning big ESL events and the Majors all count towards the associated points totals. Only a team’s six best results count towards their points total.
Of course, with the partnered Counter-Strike leagues set to sunset in 2024 after Valve’s decision to implement a more level playing field in CS2 esports, you can expect significant format changes here heading into 2025 and beyond. In fact, this edition of the BLAST Premier World Final is set to be the last one of its kind.
This year’s participants are the following teams:
Let’s get into what they have to offer and what storylines fans have to look forward to in more detail below, including their betting odds to win the entire tournament.
(chopper, magixx, zont1x, donk, sh1ro)
Qualified by winning the Spring Final and IEM Katowice
#5 in HLTV rankings
Team Spirit had a stellar start to the calendar year as they stormed Katowice and showed the world what donk is all about, winning the S-Tier tournament at a canter with the youngster becoming the youngest-ever player to be named an HLTV MVP at an elite event while also achieving the highest-ever recorded rating at 1.70. From the Play-Ins to the grand final, they only dropped just one map throughout, and they had a flawless run in the playoffs as they defeated Falcons and FaZe in imperious fashion.
No wonder their quarterfinal exit in the Copenhagen Major was seen as a disappointment. With top four wins and title tilts to follow, it seemed like an aberration at the time – but as we are headed deeper and deeper into the second half of the year, it really does feel like Spirit are beginning to be found out, and it’s more and more often that we see frustrations rather than smiles on donk’s face.
Team Spirit are still ranked at #5 on the HLTV leaderboards, but their results since winning the BLAST Premier Spring Final in June have been a far cry from how they started out in 2024. A joint-last exit from the main event at IEM Cologne, a quarterfinals exit at the hands of NAVI in ESL Pro League Season 20, another early playoffs exit at the Fall Finals: the only bright spot is their BetBoom Dacha Belgrade 2024 #2 win, but that event only featured one other top ten team in the form of MOUZ. So is it a surprise that they are far from favorites heading into this prestigious event?
Still, even if this roster configuration has run its course – and there are rumors suggesting that a post-Major shakeup might be on the cards –, who’s to say donk won’t go nuclear again to defy all the odds and push Team Spirit to victory?
(huNter-, NiKo, m0NESY, malbsMd, Snax)
Qualified by winning the Fall Final
#2 in HLTV rankings
G2 have been such a frustrating team to follow and analyze across the past few years. On paper, the core should have everything needed to embark on an era-defining run, yet NiKo, inarguably the best rifler in modern Counter-Strike history, ended the Global Offensive era without a Major win to his name. Even with m0NESY, a fantastic young AWPer, and huNter-, his cousin and an uber-reliable anchor, the team has never found a consistently winning formula, despite cycling through many acclaimed coaches and in-game leaders across the years. Look at Aleksib now, embarking on an incredible run with NAVI and making the team clearly more than the sum of its parts – he looked out of his depth on G2.
And yet, whenever you feel like an implosion is coming, they somehow rally and put up an incredible run. It was G2, not NAVI, who won the Fall Final (even if it was the former’s first win in ten attempts over Aleksib’s new squad), but before you would even have the chance to reappraise their odds, they’d bomb out in joint-last place at IEM Rio.
Seriously, what should we make of this consistently inconsistent sort-of-superteam?
The jury is also very much still out on the new IGL-coach combo on the G2 squad, with Polish legends Snax and TaZ teaming up again for a new adventure. Neither player was previously known for their deep tactical playbook, even if Snax has definitely been a cerebral player, and all comms excerpts and commentaries seem to suggest that TaZ’s role is primarily to be a hype man rather than a playbook author. As for Snax’s individual ratings, his fragging output struggles to even match up with HooXi’s, who was notoriously one of the weakest in that department in pro play.
And somehow, they are still #2 on the HLTV rankings. So, how do you make a prediction for this team? Perhaps the best angle to take is that they are a supremely momentum-based team who may come in cold into a tournament and never get going but who can also take a hot streak all the way to a championship win. It’s worth seeing how the group stage shapes up for them before dipping your toes into the betting pool.
Also, rumors suggest that Team Falcons, like vultures, are circulating around the squad, looking to finally poach NiKo after the Major to make up for failed previous attempts at doing so. If nothing else, this may add to the sense of chaos and instability in the G2 squad – or a Last Dance-like focus to achieve something great. Who can tell with this team for sure?
(b1t, Aleksib, jL, iM, w0nderful)
Qualified by winning the PGL Copenhagen Major
#1 in HLTV rankings
Without a doubt, the most impressive team of 2023, Aleksib’s Natus Vincere is now definitely up there with Boombl4’s online era vintage in terms of the best squads the black-and-yellow outfit has had to offer. Under normal circumstances, they would clearly be the runaway favorites for this event, as well as any other one they enter right now.
However, there is a very real concern about fatigue in the squad, as legendary IGL Aleksib and hall-of-famer coach B1ade will continue to try and steer the team to a potential repeat Major win in a few months’ time. We’ve seen how deep they had to dig to complete their comeback against Heroic at the IEM Rio semifinals, and one has to wonder whether the two weeks since they lifted the trophy there were enough to partially rest and recuperate.
NAVI are on the verge of an era – the question is whether they have the stamina to get there. The playbook and the raw skill are certainly there for them to do just that, and they must be seen as the favorites for the BLAST Premier World Final as well.
(apEX, ZywOo, Spix, flameZ, JACKZ*)
Qualified by winning the PGL Copenhagen Major
#3 in HLTV rankings
It hasn’t been a banner year for Vitality, and it feels like the shattered equilibrium after zonic’s departure to Falcons’ supposedly greener pastures is still somewhat out of whack, with that intangible edge missing from the team’s play. Still, the combo of apEX and ZywOo remains as potent as ever, a wily in-game leader and an AWPing prodigy teaming up for deadly effect over and over again – and unlike G2, Vitality are consistent playoff participants and a strong gatekeeper team for anyone looking to lift a title. Their win at IEM Cologne, an impressive 3-1 triumph over NAVI, showed the Counter-Strike world that they are still not to be underestimated.
There is a sting in the tale this time, however, one that will likely affect their winning chances at the BLAST Premier World Finals. Vitality will have to play with a stand-in as JACKZ (formerly of TSM, HEET, and G2) will slot in for mezii, who is awaiting the birth of his first child, so the squad has decided far in advance that he’ll get to take the time off to be with his family. The plans were made long in advance (and he is expected to return by the time the Major qualifiers roll around), but it’s a definite disruption for Vitality.
That being said, there will be an element of familiarity at play, nevertheless, considering JACKZ had already fulfilled a stand-in role on Vitality once before when dupreeh was also away on parental leave back in early 2023 and missed out on the group stage of ESL Pro League Season 17. JACKZ posted an impressive +27 K/D on the six maps he’s played there, but he has not been able to achieve anything similar in any of the tournaments he has played in the intervening one and a half years. Realistically, this downgrade may push Vitality to the lower rungs of the list of participants – but with six of the eight teams making it out of the group stage, they should still be fine.
(rain, broky, ropz, karrigan, frozen)
Qualified via Global Leaderboard position
#6 in HLTV rankings
It feels like the end of an era that never was. Karrigan’s return to FaZe started out slow, but it turned into a glorious affair once ropz was brought on board, netting him and rain a long overdue Major win in Antwerp. Even once Twistzz moved on, with frozen as his replacement, the squad was clearly the strongest of the bunch in the early CS2 era but couldn’t quite convert their strengths to dominance – as evidenced by their shock grand final loss to NAVI at the Copenhagen major.
Since then, it’s been turbulent, to say the least. The toughest part is that it’s impossible to pinpoint a specific weak point or failing but the results are simply aren’t there when it comes to the business end of the CS2 tournaments they now participate in. Father Time is chipping away at karrigan and rain, but not to the extent that they can’t still turn back the clock often enough to provide more than mere veterancy and intangibles. Broky is frustratingly inconsistent, but his highs are match-winning. Ropz and frozen, even with temporary struggles, are fantastic young riflers that most orgs would love to build a core around.
So what is going wrong? No one really knows – and this is what makes it so difficult to predict how FaZe will do at the BLAST Premier World Final. It just feels like structural fatigue, inertia, calcification. No wonder it feels so difficult to even suggest a solution or a roster change to shake things up. The only thing we know for sure is that if there has ever been a core that’s been able to repeatedly reinvent itself in the modern era, it’s karrigan’s FaZe 2.0. No doubt the Shanghai Major will be a watershed moment for their future prospects – and this event is an important dress rehearsal. But it’s no mistake that they had to rely on the global leaderboard to qualify rather than any notable tournament win.
(torzsi, xertioN, siuhy, Jimpphat, Brollan)
Qualified via Global Leaderboard position
#4 in HLTV rankings
Arguably the most impressively-ran org in all of Counter-Strike, the young guns of MOUZ are no longer just magnificent underdogs but a tournament-threatening squad in their own right. Siuhy has developed into a fantastic in-game leader, proving himself worthy of the upset run to the BLAST Paris Major grand final with GamerLegion. With 3-0 grand final wins over Team Vitality and Team Spirit in May, it’s clear they have the potential to take down any event – but no tournament wins have followed since, with some frustratingly early exists peppered amid playoff runs at IEM Dallas and ESL Pro League Season 20.
The biggest issue of MOUZ, really, is their awful matchup against NAVI. While they are not alone with the whole “struggling against the best team in the world” thing, three of MOUZ’s last five tournament runs were ended by Aleksib’s merry men, and that’s a definite ceiling they need to shatter through they are looking to lift the trophy at this year’s BLAST Premier World Final.
(dev1ce, Staehr, stavn, jabbi, cadiaN)
Qualified via Global Leaderboard position
#17 in HLTV rankings
What a mess. What an absolute mess. Not for the first time, Astralis have relied on underhanded tactics to make roster changes as they continue to flounder in a bid to return to the Major-winning glory days. The former Danish powerhouse has fallen so far from grace that they have missed out on three consecutive Majors entirely, even with legendary AWPer dev1ce returning to the fold. Since then, we’ve seen multiple roster configurations and dramatic departures, with controversies swirling around the squad and the org over and over again.
The latest chaotic saga involved the benching of br0, the latest young Danish player who was churned through the grinder amid larger political shifts. This time, it was the shock pickup of cadiaN that led to problems, as the organization wanted to incorporate their new in-game leader as fast as possible, providing conflicting information and skirting the substitution rules to incorporate their new IGL for the BLAST Premier Fall Final, no doubt in a bid to get extra playtime with their reworked roster ahead of the Shanghai Major qualifiers. They lost 13-0 on their first map to Vitality and went out in joint-last place.
While Astralis did qualify for the World Final via the leaderboard, it is important to keep in mind that it was not this roster configuration that got them there. Their HLTV ranking tells a more accurate tale: right now, they are clearly the weakest and most unstable team among the competitors. And that is before we’ve even discussed the elephant in the room – that cadiaN has reunited with the two players, jabbi and stavn, who first engineered his kicking from Heroic, then still left the team for Astralis, with their former org notoriously charging an “asshole tax” after credible allegations of tapping-up. It was a poor start for a combustible quintet, and there’s little reason to suggest that quick improvement could follow.
(NAF, YEKINDAR, Twistzz, ultimate, jks)
Qualified via Global Leaderboard position
#9 in HLTV rankings
Team Liquid have long been in the wilderness, struggling to make an impact with their international rosters, including a surprisingly ineffective stint with cadiaN at the helm. Since then, Twistzz has been tasked with making sense of the ashes, and the Canadian rifler has done a surprisingly effective job. 2003-born ultimate has also turned out to be an inspired pickup, even if all observers agree that the only sort of anchoring role YEKINDAR is capable of nowadays is the one that sinks his whole team to the bottom of the sea.
It’s very much a work in progress for Team Liquid, and it would be a huge surprise to see them make it to the playoffs against G2, Spirit, and Vitality – but on the plus side, at least they won’t run into FaZe, who are still a bogey team for them. No doubt Twistzz’s time on karrigan’s team has a huge impact in that regard – but it would be a surprise to see that come into play at the BLAST Premier World Final.
(The odds to win are accurate as of the time of writing, and they are subject to change.)
Fans can follow the BLAST Premier World Final on BLAST’s Twitch and YouTube channels, with additional coverage available on a wide range of community sites ranging from live results and score tracking to analysis and commentary. Counter-Strike fans often flock to HLTV for up-to-date statistics and live match scores, and quickly produced recaps. For community discussion, the r/GlobalOffensive subreddit remains the best place to be for all things Counter-Strike, with over 2.5 million subscribers. BLAST also offers a dedicated highlight channel where you can catch up on the games and the blast.tv website features original content from the tournament operator, ranging from news writeups to interviews.
Of course, if you want to stay up to date on all things Counter-Strike, esports, and gambling, you should also definitely bookmark the Bitsler blog for a great collection of analysis and writeups on the biggest happenings in the worlds of sports and gaming!
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