The first day of Stake Ranked Episode 4 has concluded with both of the highest-ranked teams, FaZe and Astralis, suffering losses in their openers to Nemiga and Alliance, respectively.
Luminosity and BIG also picked up wins over B8 and fnatic in their openers, which were crucial as both teams remain in the fight for one of the last Singapore Major spots and are now set to face off in a high-stakes head-to-head match in the upper bracket semi-finals.
Alliance recovered from 10-6 and 12-14 deficits to edge out a victory on their Inferno pick despite going 9-21 in opening duels, and showed fortitude after a blowout on Cache with another comeback from 5-9 down on the Nuke decider.
The loss meant little for Astralis' Singapore Major hopes with several events still to play and a decent spot in the ranking, but it still comes as a setback for the team amidst a deflated run of form.
FaZe's loss to Nemiga is more significant as the Russian team is one of their direct rivals for a Major invite. A win would have increased FaZe's odds of making the Major to 77% according to HLTV's new simulator page, but the defeat has instead left them with just a 48% chance.
The fashion in which the loss came about adds insult to injury as FaZe squandered a 9-2 lead on Mirage, winning just three of the next 17 rounds after a complete collapse on the T side. Their struggles continued on Ancient as Nemiga were a step ahead on the offense, putting up seven rounds despite a 0-3 start before eventually converting a 10-5 lead after the swap to win 13-11.
The matchups for day two are as follows:
Nemiga
Aleksandr 'KaiR0N-' Anashkin
Kirill 'Xant3r' Kononov
Nikita 'robo' Dushin
Beksultan 'khaN' Ospan
Daniel 'syph0' Ageyev
Anton 'boX' Burko
Astralis
Rasmus 'HooXi' Nielsen
Love 'phzy' Smidebrant
Jakob 'jabbi' Nygaard
Victor 'Staehr' Staehr
Gytis 'ryu' Glušauskas
Filip 'NEO' Kubski
fnatic
Rodion 'fEAR' Smyk
Dmytro 'jambo' Semera
Nikita 'jackasmo' Skyba
Artem 'cairne' Mushynskyi
Volodymyr 'mazay' Iorhachov
Miks 'Independent' Siliņš
B8
Alexey 'alex666' Yarmoshchuk
Andrii 'npl' Kukharskyi
Artem 'kensizor' Kapran
Dmytro 'esenthial' Tsvir
Danylo 's1zzi' Vinnyk
Ivan 'maddened' Iordanidi
Luminosity
Aleks 'Rainwaker' Petrov
Aurélien 'afro' Drapier
Lucas 'lux' Meneghini
Simon 'yxngstxr' Boije
Oscar 'AZUWU' Bell
Alexander 'kakafu' Szymanczyk
FaZe
David 'frozen' Čerňanský
Russel 'Twistzz' Van Dulken
Ryan 'Neityu' Aubry
Jakub 'jcobbb' Pietruszewski
Jason 'JBOEN' Boe Nielsen
Niclas 'enkay J' Krumhorn
Alliance
Simon 'twist' Eliasson
Sean 'eraa' Knutsson
Jonatan 'bobeksde' Persson
Markus 'upE' Johansson
Arvid 'avid' Åberg
Simon 'Hawk' Vävinggren
BIG
Johannes 'tabseN' Wodarz
Jon 'JDC' de Castro
Josef 'faveN' Baumann
Benjamin 'blameF' Bremer
Gleb 'gr1ks' Gazin
Sebastian 'xenn' Hoch