The second round of the EMEA Kickoff middle bracket featured the region's four Champions 2025 representatives fighting to stay out of the lower bracket. FNATIC FNATIC Europe Rank #1 crashies Austin Roberts Boaster Jake Howlett kaajak Kajetan Haremski Veqaj Sylvain Pattyn Alfajer Emir Ali Beder and GIANTX GIANTX Europe Rank #5 Cloud Kirill Nehozhin grubinho Grzegorz Ryczko westside Miłosz Duda Flickless Karel Maeckelbergh ara Hanceriuc Eduard-George ultimately emerged victorious, earning comfortable 2-0 sweeps over Team Liquid Team Liquid Europe Rank #25 purp0 Semyon Borchev wayne Wayne Chang MiniBoo Dominykas Lukaševičius nAts Ayaz Akhmetshin kamo Kamil Frąckowiak and Team Heretics Team Heretics Europe Rank #3 Wo0t Mert Alkan RieNs Enes Ecirli benjyfishy Benjamin David Fish ComeBack Berkcan Şentürk Boo Ričardas Lukaševičius respectively.

FNATIC batters Team Liquid in one-sided series

The first match of the day saw two familiar opponents in their fifteenth matchup over the past five years. Both sides sought to prove themselves after shaky 2-1 wins over their previous middle bracket opponents.

FNATIC selected Corrode for the first map after both teams had lost their most recent showings on it. On broadcast, the coaching staff cited attack side improvements as the reason behind the pick, and although FNATIC still struggled to manage the clock in certain rounds, they did find more success with seven attacking round wins rather than the two they picked up in regulation versus FUT.

On defense, FNATIC continued to be as stalwart as ever, shutting Liquid down at every turn and winning six consecutive rounds off the back of an Alfajer ace on the bonus to win a straightforward 13-5. Alfajer and crashies stood together at the top of the scoreboard, the former going 18/10/2 with 282 ACS on Vyse and the latter going 19/10/4 with 292 ACS as Sova.

Split was a mirror matchup as both sides opted into a Raze-Yoru frontline and an Astra-Viper backline. FNATIC started on the attack side with their signature slow pace, exploiting Liquid's passive and disjointed setups to force a double timeout from Liquid by 6-1. After the timeout, Liquid got more proactive, but the damage was done and the half ended 9-3 in favor of FNATIC.

In the second half, Liquid began pulling back the score, winning pivotal rounds including a 1v2 from MiniBoo in round 16 and an all-in force buy in round 19 to bring things back to 11-9. That was as far as they could go, however, as Alfajer found a Showstopper double kill in the final round to take the map 13-9.

FNATIC moves on in the middle bracket and will next play Natus Vincere Natus Vincere Europe Rank #11 sociablEE Volkan Yonal Filu Dawid Czarnecki Shao Andrey Kiprsky Ruxic Uğur Güç hiro Emirhan Kat , with the middle final still two more wins away. Team Liquid descend to the lower bracket and will fight for survival against the winner of PCIFIC Esports versus ULF Esports.

GIANTX finds first-ever win over Heretics in 2-0 fashion

The last time GIANTX and Heretics faced off, Heretics eliminated GIANTX from the lower bracket of the Champions Paris playoffs. GIANTX today exacted their revenge in two maps, defeating Heretics for the first time in their fifth all-time attempt.

For the first map, GIANTX took Heretics to Abyss, where Heretics opted into a traditional Ascent-esque composition with Jett, Sova, KAY/O, and Cypher. The first half was a close 6-6 affair; GIANTX had a 3-0 start after shutting down a round two Stinger force buy from Heretics, but Heretics responded via punishing GIANTX's aggressive pushes and pulling off multiple B site executes.

Heretics gained the upper hand at the start of the second half, going up 10-7, but everything came crashing down for them soon after as GIANTX won a thrifty round in round 18 and Flickless pulled off a 1v3 in round 20. From there, GIANTX held fast to the advantage they were given, streaking all the way back to a 13-10 win.

GIANTX continued their momentum into Haven, winning the second-round eco to take an instant 5-1 lead. While westside surprised with a Veto pick, ara and Flickless turned out to be the critical pieces of the puzzle as ara racked up Outlaw and Operator kills as Neon and Flickless held down key choke points as Viper.

Heretics managed to get five rounds by halftime by punishing GIANTX's proactive reclears, but the second half was all GIANTX. Heretics repeatedly allowed GIANTX to get onto sites with minimal resistance and found any retakes all but impossible against the Viper and Veto utility. GIANTX were completely in control as they won out 13-7. Flickless was the top fragger on the map and the series as a whole, going 23/12/9 on Haven and 41/29/16 overall.

GIANTX are now set to play Team Vitality Team Vitality Europe Rank #4 Jamppi Elias Olkkonen PROFEK Dawid Święć Derke Nikita Sirmitev Chronicle Timofey Khromov Sayonara Ștefan Mîtcu in the next round of the middle bracket, with the winner headed to a match against the winner of NAVI versus FNATIC. Heretics, down to the lower bracket, will await the winner of Karmine Corp versus FUT Esports.

EMEA Kickoff will return on Tuesday, Feb. 3 with the following matches:

• Karmine Corp vs. FUT Esports (Lower Round 1)
• PCIFIC Esports vs. ULF Esports (Lower Round 1)