FOKUS beat Aurora in the first round of the online portion of BLAST Bounty 2026 Season 2, with a commanding 13-4 in the Dust2 decider map after splitting Cache, 13-11, and Nuke, 7-13.
This result marks Aurora's first loss in their new international endeavor after victories against K27 and Nemesis in the StarLadder StarSeries Fall 2026 Europe Closed Qualifier, and ends their aspirations of playing their first LAN event together in Malta.
FOKUS, on the other hand, started StarLadder StarSeries Fall 2026 Europe Closed Qualifier with a 1-2 loss to Astralis, and now claim their first win with Paavo "podi" Heiskanen and Jacob "jocab" Nerheden to secure a chance in the next round of the bracket.
The series kicked off on the latest map to be added to the Active Duty pool, Cache, and although Aurora got off to a flying start with a 5-0 out of the gate on the CT side, FOKUS linked six straight of their own in an even half.
Down 8-9, jocab had a big round, killing three to tie it up. Then, with 11-11 on the board, he had a big opening kill against Ismailcan "XANTARES" Dörtkardeş and took down Özgür "woxic" Eker to turn the tide of the round in a 3v3, after which his team secured map point. Back-to-back openers by Mateo "Matheos" Prišlin the following round all but sealed the 13-11 victory.
Nuke was a much more one-sided affair as the Turkish duo of XANTARES, with a 1.55 rating, and Ali "Wicadia" Haydar Yalçın, with a 1.45, led the way for Aurora. A 6-6 half on the T side led to a landslide victory on the defense, as they gave up just one round to force the decider, 13-7.
Aurora's game crumbled on Dust2, where FOKUS got off to a 7-0 start, including a smoke defuse by podi in a 1v2 situation, before ending the half by hitting double digits. From there, it was only a matter of time as Aurora's two rounds immediately after the switch were merely cosmetic in FOKUS' final 13-4 victory to secure the series.
Ismailcan 'XANTARES' Dörtkardeş
Astralis
Rasmus 'HooXi' Nielsen
Love 'phzy' Smidebrant
Jakob 'jabbi' Nygaard
Victor 'Staehr' Staehr
Gytis 'ryu' Glušauskas
Filip 'NEO' Kubski
Jacob 'jocab' Nerheden
Paavo 'podi' Heiskanen
Aurora
Ismailcan 'XANTARES' Dörtkardeş
Özgür 'woxic' Eker
Jimi 'Jimpphat' Salo
Damjan 'kyxsan' Stoilkovski
Ali 'Wicadia' Haydar Yalçın
Ashley 'ash' Battye
Ali 'Wicadia' Haydar Yalçın
Mateo 'Matheos' Prišlin
FOKUS
Erik 'ztr' Gustafsson
Matias 'Banjo' Kivistö
Paavo 'podi' Heiskanen
Jacob 'jocab' Nerheden
Mateo 'Matheos' Prišlin
Jakub 'kuben' Gurczyński
Nemesis
Ivan 'SELLTER' Miroshnikov
Evgeny 'r3salt' Frolov
Alemkhan 'mag1k3Y' Moldakamalov
Philipp 'tex1y' Moskvitin
Daniil 'Sdaim' Tupov
Maksim 'NMV' Naumov
Özgür 'woxic' Eker
K27
Timur 'clax' Sabirov
Daniil 'X5G7V' Maryshev
Aleksey 'xeedo' Mikulich
Danila 'kashl1d' Dronov
Daniil 'qw1nk1' Kabilov
Gregory 'balblna' Oleinick