paiN Disqualified from BLAST Open London 2025

The Brazilian team paiN Gaming will not take part in the upcoming BLAST Open London 2025 Counter-Strike 2 championship, set to kick off at the end of August. Tournament organizers have officially confirmed that the vacant spot in the participants list will be filled by another Brazilian squad — Imperial.

In a statement, BLAST explained that the decision was made in accordance with Valve’s tournament rule 3.2.5(c). Under this regulation, teams that previously declined an invitation to the same event automatically forfeit their right to participate in it. This is exactly what happened with paiN: the club initially turned down a direct invite to the closed South American qualifier for BLAST Open Season 2, which led to their disqualification from the London stage.

BLAST Open London 2025 will run from August 27 to September 7, 2025, featuring 16 teams. The group stage will be played online in a GSL format, with the top six teams advancing to London for the playoffs. The event’s prize pool is set at $400,000.

The full list of participants is as follows: 

• Vitality

• MOUZ

• Team Spirit

• FaZe

• FURIA

• NAVI 

• GamerLegion

• G2

• Legacy

• Virtus.pro 

• Heroic

• FlyQuest

• M80

• ECSTATIC

• Liquid

• Imperial

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The replacement of paiN with Imperial adds extra intrigue to South America’s representation at the tournament, with fans already anticipating intense clashes on the British stage.