BLAST Open Spring teams announced

On Monday, February 9, BLAST announced 12 Counter-Strike 2 teams that secured direct invites to the second BLAST Open tournament of the season.

Scheduled to kick off on March 18, BLAST Open Spring 2026 is the fifth S-Tier CS2 event of the year and the first of the BLAST Open series.

The tournament will feature 16 teams, 12 of which have received direct invites based on the Valve Regional Standings (VRS) as of the February update.

The list of directly invited squads includes familiar names: FURIA, Team Vitality, PARIVISION, Team Falcons, Natus Vincere, Team Spirit, MOUZ, FaZe Clan, Aurora Gaming, The MongolZ, and Team Liquid, with B8 taking the final spot as the 12th-highest-rated squad in the world.

B8 edged out G2 Esports on the VRS by 18 points, as well as 3DMAX (30 points), and Astralis (31 points).

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  Fast Payouts

The remaining four spots are filled in by champions of BLAST Rising events – Ninjas in Pyjamas (Europe), NRG (North America), 9z Team (South America), and TYLOO (Asia).

Set to kick off on March 18, BLAST Open Spring will begin with two double-elimination groups of eight teams.

All group stage matches will be played at BLAST Studios in Copenhagen, as best-of-three, with the top three teams from each group proceeding to the playoffs.

Group stage winners will receive a semifinal bye, while the second- and third-place teams will proceed to the quarterfinals as the top and bottom seeds, respectively.

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  The bookies' bookie

The playoffs will move to Ahoy Arena in Rotterdam and feature a single-elimination bracket, with all games played as best-of-three except the grand final, which is best-of-five.

With the BLAST Open Spring team list announced, the focus now shifts to PGL Cluj-Napoca, which begins on February 14.

As the third S-Tier tournament of the year, the Romanian event will welcome the world’s top 16 teams.

That includes Team Vitality and FURIA, who the top CS2 betting sites have listed as the main title contenders, at +162 and +350, respectively.