Team Falcons to field Nucleonz as a stand-in for BLAST Open

On Tuesday, March 17, Team Falcons announced that their star Counter-Strike 2 player, Maksim “kyousuke” Lukinwill not be available for the opening match of BLAST Open Spring 2026.

The 18-year-old has been ruled out for the Team Falcons’ match against NRG on Wednesday, in the opening round of Group A.

While he will miss the first game, kyousuke’s availability for the remainder of the tournament remains unknown.

While kyousukeis sorting out his visa, he will be replaced by Matej “Nucleonz” Trajkoski, who previously served as a substitute for the Russian player during the BLAST Bounty Winter.

Yet despite being a relatively unproven player at the highest tier of competitive Counter-Strike, Nucleonz has left a positive mark in his first stint as Falcons’ stand-in.

He helped the team reach the finals of the BLAST Bounty event, averaging a 0.85 performance rating in his first S-Tier tournament.

The current situation with kyousuke and his availability is shrouded in mist, as there is a possibility he could miss the entire event.

Due to his visa restrictions, Team Falcons also need to be very selective of which events they intend to participate in this season. However, with many of the biggest upcoming competitions happening in Europe, the Russian is likely to skip more.

Even with kyousuke out of the picture, Team Falcons are expected to start BLAST Open Spring strong.

The best CS2 bookmakers have them priced as -1666.67 favorites to defeat NRG and take one step closer to the playoffs.

On the outright markets, Falcons are given a 13.3% implied probability of winning the event, behind Team Spirit at +500, FURIA at +450, and Team Vitality as the undisputed favorites, at +125.