Today's China Kickoff matches saw JDG Esports JDG Esports China Rank #7 stew Park Young-chan (박영찬) jkuro Yong Haochong (杨浩聪) zhe Niu Zhe (牛哲) Yuicaw Huang Yung-chieh (黃湧傑) coconut Colin Patrick Chung (钟弘祖) eliminating FunPlus Phoenix FunPlus Phoenix China Rank #11 BerLIN Zhang Bolin (張柏霖) Life Qu Donghao (瞿东豪) AAAAY Zhang Yang (张杨) sScary Nutchapon Matarat Setrod Ou Taigeng (欧泰赓) 2-1 in the lower bracket and Xi Lai Gaming Xi Lai Gaming China Rank #2 WsLeo Huang Pinwei (黄品维) Lysoar Liang Youhao (梁优好) NoMan James Man Rarga Arthur Churyumov happywei Deng Minwei (邓闵维) breezing past EDward Gaming EDward Gaming China Rank #3 ZmjjKK Zheng Yongkang (郑永康) nobody Wang Senxu (王森旭) CHICHOO Wan Shunzhi (万顺治) cb Wang Qingchuan (王庆川) Smoggy Zhang Zhao (张钊) in a dominant 2-0 in the upper bracket.

JDG sends off FPX in stomp-filled 2-1

The first match pitted JDG and FPX against each other to determine which team would place last alongside Nova Esports Nova Esports China Rank #18 OBONE Chen Yijie (陈怡洁) Ezeir Zhao Zejun (赵泽骏) GREEN Qiu Jianzhi (邱建智) heybay Ho Shun Hei GuanG Guang Honglin (光洪霖) . JDG ultimately survived the encounter, sending off FPX with only one map win over three matches.

The series began on JDG's pick of Pearl. JDG took control initially, stringing together five consecutive rounds and snowballing the economy to go up 5-2, but FPX responded with five of their own for a 7-5 lead at the half thanks to strong A site holds and multikills from sScary and AAAAY .

AAAAY continued to be the hero for FPX in the second half as he won the bonus round with a 1v3 ace, spurring his side on all the way to a 13-5 victory as they completed an 11-round win streak. The Killjoy player ended the map with an outsized 25/7/1 KDA, 347 ACS, and 224 ADR.

AAAAY hits a stunning ace to lead FPX to a flawless attacking side.

Bind was an even more one-sided affair, this time in favor of JDG. FPX could find no answers to JDG's defense even with their double-Duelist composition as JDG repeatedly shut down Life on Raze and Setrod on Yoru, securing the first pick 11 times out of 12 rounds for a 10-2 first half. A second pistol win spelled a quick 13-3 end to the map. Yuicaw 's Viper play was the key centerpiece to JDG's defenses; he ended the map 20/7/7 with 343 ACS and 196 ADR.

Yuicaw locks down the B site with a 4K.

Haven was the decider. Starting off on the attack, FPX found repeated success on the C site, going up 4-2 before JDG adjusted and drew the score back to 4-4. The half ended in a 6-6 deadlock as the teams traded the remaining rounds back and forth.

The rest of the map was all JDG. stew kickstarted JDG's momentum with a 4K to win the bonus round, and jkuro found multiple multikills to keep it going. FPX looked overwhelmed with their opponent's rapid site hits as the 6-6 score blossomed to 10-6 and then 13-7.

stew ended the map at the top of the scoreboard with 21 kills, 176 ADR, and five first kills on Neon. The first kill tally continued to favor JDG throughout the series, as all five JDG members ended the overall match with positive FK/FD differentials.

JDG moves on in the lower bracket and will next face Titan Esports Club Titan Esports Club China Rank #17 Haodong Guo Haodong (郭浩东) lucas Yunkun Lu (路昀昆) Dynamite Zhao Zihao (赵梓浩) Abo Han Bohao (韩博皓) Coco Ding Dajian (丁达建) , who they previously defeated 2-1 in their opening match.

XLG sails past EDG to progress to upper final

As two of the region's titans and recent international representatives, XLG and EDG both sought to earn the remaining spot in the upper final after strong starts in the tournament. In the end, XLG dominated the former world champions and stand one win away from Masters Santiago.

Split was a first-time showing from both teams as both teams opted into similar double-Duelist compositions, with EDG favoring Neon and Yoru and XLG favoring Waylay and Yoru. EDG took an early 5-1 advantage after winning the second round eco, running over XLG's setups with fast site executes. XLG wrested back control after a timeout from coach hvoya to lead 7-5 at the half, leaning more into retakes and adjusting their setups to better handle the entry pathing from cb and ZmjjKK .

The second half was flawless for XLG. The Ascension squad won the pistol, dismantled EDG's B main aggression to win the bonus, and ended the map early 13-5 with the ultimates they had saved up. happywei stood out on Viper with a 20/8/7 KDA and 195 ADR.

happywei kept his form up going into Pearl, kicking off the map with an instant ace in the pistol round and leading XLG to a 9-3 defense side. EDG's attack appeared disjointed as they often failed to create pressure around the map and ran into stacked sites; two out of their three rounds came from heroics from cb.

An ace from happywei wins XLG the 3v5.

A second pistol round for XLG created an insurmountable 11-3 deficit for EDG as XLG won the map 13-6. happywei put up another 20 kills for a series-high 40-kill performance over 37 total rounds.

EDG drops down to the middle bracket and will face familiar opponents Bilibili Gaming Bilibili Gaming China Rank #1 whzy Wang Haozhe (王昊哲) rushia Wang Xiaojie (王晓杰) nephh Marcus Tan Knight Liu Yuxiang (刘宇翔) bud Yang Renyu (杨韧余) on Wednesday, Feb. 4. Meanwhile, XLG progress to the upper final versus All Gamers All Gamers China Rank #14 Shr1mp Yang Yong (杨勇) K1ra Huang Zhihao (黄志豪) Au1 Zhu Yihao (朱逸豪) f4ngeer Roman Smirnov iamgrq Gao Ruiqi (高锐琦) and have to win one best-of-five series out of three chances to qualify for Santiago.

China Kickoff will return on Feb. 3 and continue every day until it finishes on Feb. 9. The next upcoming matches are as follows: