A viewership record is broken on day three of BLAST Bounty

Over 480,000 people tuned in concurrently to watch Imperial fe take on NAVI.

It was another tough day for the bounty hunters in BLAST Bounty, with higher seeds Natus Vincere, FaZe and Eternal Fire all securing wins, taking down Imperial Valkyries, M80 and Fluxo respectively.

Virtus.pro were the only lower-seeded team to claim a bounty on day three, as they took down Complexity to start life without Dzhami "⁠Jame⁠" Ali at the helm in winning fashion.

The highlight game of the day came at the end of play, as the third-ranked team team in the world, Natus Vincere, took on the dominant force in the women's scene, Imperial Valkyries. Many expected a complete blowout in favour of Natus Vincere, but the European combine were made to work for their win.

Imperial Valkyries started off the series promisingly on Ancient, posting a thoroughly competitive T side that included a clever A fake and some strong fragging by Alexandra "⁠twenty3⁠" Timonina and Zainab "⁠zAAz⁠" Turkie.

A converted pistol win set Imperial Valkyries off to a strong start on their CT side, but the superior firepower of Natus Vincere shone through as Justinas "⁠jL⁠" Lekavicius and Ihor "⁠w0nderful⁠" Zhdanov ran riot to secure the map victory.

Mirage played out in much the same fashion, with Imperial Valkyries posting a respectable first-half effort before fading as the map wore on. This time it was Valeriy "⁠b1t⁠" Vakhovskiy who proved to be their undoing, the Ukrainian rifler racking up 140 ADR and 31 frags by the time the map was done.

The series was concurrently watched by over 480,000 according to Esports Charts, comfortably securing Imperial Valkyries the record as the most-watched women's team in CS history.

FaZe meanwhile kicked off their first season with Jonathan "⁠EliGE⁠" Jablonowski amongst their number with a victory, but M80 put up stiffer resistance than was expected considering they fielded a stand-in.

Said stand-in, Nils "⁠k1to⁠" Gruhne, was actually M80's highest-rated player across the series as the team made FaZe sweat, but were undone by FaZe's star power down the stretch.

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The one match of the day that saw the lower seed win was Virtus.pro's bout with Complexity, although the North American side ran their opponents close on both maps played.

Ultimately, powerful performances by Timur "⁠FL4MUS⁠" Marev and Petr "⁠fame⁠" Bolyshev won the day, but Complexity can take heart from the fact they gave a good account of themselves in their first outing since the devastating loss of EliGE in the player break.

And finally, Ismailcan "⁠XANTARES⁠" Dörtkardeş continued to prove his top 20 pedigree by guiding Eternal Fire to a relatively comfortable victory over Fluxo, bagging over 100 ADR in the process.

Samet "⁠jottAAA⁠" Köklü didn't have the most successful series individually in his debut for Eternal Fire's main team, but it mattered little as the Turkish squad proved too much for their Brazilian opponents.