Who won spots to IEM Rio 2024? Results of the closed European qualifiers
The intense tournament schedule does not give the teams a chance to rest. In addition to the largest tournaments from ESL and BLAST, several smaller championships will be held before the Perfect World Shanghai Major 2024. One of them will be IEM Rio 2024 in Brazil. The tournaments in Rio, in addition to the major, were remembered more for their atmosphere than their scale. And this year, IEM Rio should be no exception. Brazilian Counter-Strike fans are some of the hottest in the world and will definitely make a noise at the stadium. Such teams as Natus Vincere, Team Vitality, G2 Esports, MOUZ, FaZe Clan, Virtus.pro, Astralis, Complexity, The MongolZ, 9z and FURIA were invited to the championship. And the sensational paiN qualified in South America. But this is not the final list of participants, they were joined by Rare Atom from the Asian region and two more teams from Europe that overcame the closed qualifiers – Eternal Fire and HEROIC. The last slot will go to a team from North America, but for now we suggest discussing the closed qualifiers for Europe.
Eternal Fire
The Turks from Eternal Fire easily passed through the upper bracket of the closed European qualifiers. The team has not shown any great results on the tier-1 stage for a long time and it seemed that its time had already passed. However, as in the Play-In for BetBoom Dacha Belgrade 2024 #2, the team showed an excellent level of play at the qualifiers for IEM Rio 2024. Eternal Fire’s path began with a predictable victory on B8 and continued with a clean victory over Cloud9 with a score of 2:0. In the final of the upper bracket, the Turks were waiting for a meeting with Falcons, but the opponents, who are gaining momentum, also did not pose any competition. It will be interesting to watch Eternal Fire at IEM Rio 2024 itself, but now the team has gained excellent form and resembles itself in its best times, if this confidence remains until October, the Turkish team will be able to impose a fight on the favorites.
HEROIC
The second team to advance to IEM Rio 2024 through the closed European qualifiers was unexpectedly HEROIC. After the failure at BLAST Premier: Fall Showdown 2024, faith in the team had faded, but the roster was able to gather its strength and, although from second place, pass the difficult qualifiers. HEROIC’s path immediately began with big problems, in the debut match the team lost to Cloud9 with a score of 2:0 and had to get out of the lower bracket, but matches with B8, 3DMAX and fnatic were not particularly difficult for the team. After such a tight run with no chance for error, HEROIC was waiting to meet Falcons in the match for the slot, however, as with Eternal Fire, Falcons could not show their game and even on the second attempt could not get the desired slot at IEM Rio 2024.
Who failed in the closed European qualifiers for IEM Rio 2024?
The main failure of the closed European qualifiers for IEM Rio 2024 was undoubtedly Falcons, who had two chances to get the coveted ticket. Success against OG and 3DMAX was instantly forgotten after two unclear matches against Eternal Fire and HEROIC. Falcons have recently started to gain tournament form, but even this does not help to join in the most important moments. The team certainly deserved a slot at IEM Rio 2024, but they themselves failed twice with the last step for this goal.
Another failure can be called the updated roster of Cloud9. After a successful qualification for RMR, which the team finished with statistics 3-0, C9 was still expected to play more confidently and get to, albeit not the largest, but LAN tournaments. At first, it seemed that the team found itself when they beat HEROIC dry, but then they were crushed twice – by Eternal Fire and fnatic. If in the first case the loss to the Turks is understandable, the opponent is quite experienced and also in excellent shape, but the outsiders in the person of fnatic were clearly within the power of a team like Cloud9. The first appearance of the updated roster on LAN is again postponed and will probably happen only at RMR for Perfect World Shanghai Major 2024. Perhaps this is for the best, the team needs to play together and train well before the most important tournament of the season, the main thing is that it spends this time correctly.
IEM Rio 2024 does not have such a large prize pool (only $ 250,000), but still many teams want to play on LAN in Brazil. The tournament will not be held soon, from October 7 to 13, but the list of participants will make you wait for the championship, despite its not the most prestigious status compared to other larger championships. The teams that passed from the closed European qualifiers are clearly set to fight and will not be easy opponents for the invited giants.
IEM Rio 2024 Closed European Qualifier Winners:
- 1st Place – Eternal Fire
- 2nd Place – HEROIC