BIG became the second team to progress to the Esports World Cup out of the open qualifier after beating Sashi 2-1.
Map two in this series was the only one the team dropped all event long, as they justified their #2 seed with Gleb "gr1ks" Gazin in super-saiyan form.
The Belarussian AWPer, a top prospect, was the best player on the server in six maps out of eleven played and ends the qualifier with a ridiculous 1.58 rating.
The Danes of Sashi have been on a climb in the VRS as of late and picked up four valuable series wins in Paris, including the elimination of Virtus.pro. Added to their first place at CCT 2026 Europe Series 5, they're now comfortably within the top 50 on VRS.
BIG, however, proved too tough a foe as Cache and Ancient went against Nicolai "HUNDEN" Petersen's side. That was much to Benjamin "blameF" Bremer's delight, who took issue with Sashi's trash talk and let them know about it: "Why are you yelling so much when you're fucking shit?"
Down the hall, K27 took on fnatic in a tight affair which they eventually converted to main event qualification.
Both sides have new players, Timur "clax" Sabirov for K27 plus Volodymyr "mazay" Iorhachov and Artem "cairne" Mushynskyi for fnatic, and are looking to improve on their top 40 VRS rankings.
But fnatic's core all had quiet series, below 1.00 ratings, and the efforts of their new recruits could not get them over the line.
That was even after a 1v3 by mazay got fnatic a series point on map two, only for them to lose a 5v3 at 12-11, 16-13 in overtime and end up 10-4 down on map three.
That charge to 10-4 was led by #4 and #6 prospects Aleksey "xeedo" Mikulich and Daniil "qw1nk1" Kabilov, who both posted 90 ADR on the decider as K27 earned a spot in only their second-ever Big Event.
At PGL Astana, inexperience hurt the young Russians (as did their use of a stand-in in the form of Petr "fame" Bolyshev) but they will have learned from the last-place finish and can now take aim at securing some giant killings in the 32-team main event.
Timur 'clax' Sabirov
Gleb 'gr1ks' Gazin
Petr 'fame' Bolyshev
BIG
Johannes 'tabseN' Wodarz
Jon 'JDC' de Castro
Josef 'faveN' Baumann
Benjamin 'blameF' Bremer
Gleb 'gr1ks' Gazin
Sebastian 'xenn' Hoch
Aleksey 'xeedo' Mikulich
K27
Timur 'clax' Sabirov
Daniil 'X5G7V' Maryshev
Aleksey 'xeedo' Mikulich
Danila 'kashl1d' Dronov
Daniil 'qw1nk1' Kabilov
Gregory 'balblna' Oleinick
Volodymyr 'mazay' Iorhachov
Sashi
Frederik 'acoR' Gyldstrand
Casper 'Cabbi' Jensen
Rasmus 'Zyphon' Nordfoss
Anton 'Anlelele' Huynh
Mikkel 'MistR' Thomsen
Nicolai 'HUNDEN' Petersen
Virtus.pro
Nikolay 'mir' Bityukov
Vladimir 'b1st' Krasikov
Dias 'F0R3VER' Kutubay
Aleksandr 'AquaRS' Kovalev
Vadim 'tO0RO' Arkov
Dmitriy 'ProbLeM' Martinov
fnatic
Rodion 'fEAR' Smyk
Dmytro 'jambo' Semera
Nikita 'jackasmo' Skyba
Artem 'cairne' Mushynskyi
Volodymyr 'mazay' Iorhachov
Miks 'Independent' Siliņš
Daniil 'qw1nk1' Kabilov
Nicolai 'HUNDEN' Petersen
Artem 'cairne' Mushynskyi
Benjamin 'blameF' Bremer