Imperial fe's promising Katowice start turns sour after one-sided elimination by BIG

30-1-2025 20:44

The women's team was outmatched by the German team on both maps.

BIG have eliminated Imperial Valkyries from the IEM Katowice Play-in after a dominant 2-0 victory (13-4 Inferno, 13-5 Ancient), bringing an end to a hamstrung campaign in Poland for the Women's Team of the Year that was played without their in-game leader Victoria "⁠tory⁠" Kazieva.

"I hope for the next event I'm not going to be standing in," Kamen "⁠bubble⁠" Kostadinov laughed in a post-match interview with James "⁠BanKs⁠" Banks. "I really miss tory because she is a great IGL and I think I can benefit them way better as a coach (laughs)."

Johannes "⁠tabseN⁠" Wodarz's troops needed a confidence victory after starting the Play-in with a 0-12 drubbing by Wildcard and got just that, but have a steep test ahead of them as they will need to beat the loser of Eternal Fire vs. HEROIC to advance to Stage 2.

Date	Matches
IEM Katowice 2025 Play-in
31/01/2025	BIG 16:00 HEROIC	Match

No Mirage, no chance

The German side floated their regular Inferno ban to take Mirage out of play, the map that Imperial Valkyries barely lost in overtime to FURIA and had a decent showing on against Natus Vincere, and the decision paid off in spades.

Imperial Valkyries's attempt to punish pick Inferno in reply ended in disaster with BIG putting up an almost impenetrable defense, recovering from 0-2 to win the next ten rounds in a row.

Alexandra "⁠twenty3⁠" Timonina was the sole beacon of light for her team, winning a 1v3 clutch in the pistol and ending the half with a 15-11 K-D, 93.4 ADR, and 1.42 rating — more kills and a higher rating than her entire team combined.

Marcel "⁠hyped⁠" Köhn won a 1v3 with a Scout in round three and BIG never looked back, losing only the second pistol and conversion before closing out the map.

Ancient was equally as dominant with BIG running through Imperial Valkyries's CT holds, punishing bubble in Middle and A repeatedly for another 10-2 half before closing out the game not long into the second half.

zAAz, ANa comment on Imperial fe's campaign

No map wins and a dismal final two maps against BIG isn't the showing that Imperial Valkyries would have wanted in Katowice, even without their in-game leader, and the team clearly felt the difference between playing in the Impact circuit compared to a tier-one international event.

Obviously there is a huge difference," Ana "⁠ANa⁠" Dumbravă said about playing at an event with the prestige of Katowice despite winning multiple Impact trophies.

"Being the first female team to ever stand here beside the best male teams in the world is huge. We were paying more attention to work at our best, even though our coach said we were without our captain. We worked very much for it, sadly we got eliminated but all respect to BIG, they played very well today."

"I feel very proud of us, really," Zainab "⁠zAAz⁠" Turkie added. "This is a great experience for us, it's amazing to be here, it feels like a dream. This can only benefit us.

"For me at least, I don't feel like we are losers or anything, I feel like we are winners. We've been doing great and I'm very proud of us."

IEM Katowice 2025 Play-inBest of 3

BIG

Matchpage

30th January 2025

Imperial Valkyries

Inferno

Ancient

BIG	K - D	Swing	ADR	KAST	Rating2.1
Karim 'Krimbo' Moussa Krimbo	34 - 15	+4.17%	87.8	91.4%	1.54
Marcel 'hyped' Köhn hyped	29 - 15	+6.93%	82.3	77.1%	1.48
Jon 'JDC' de Castro JDC	28 - 20	+3.26%	89.7	91.4%	1.47
Johannes 'tabseN' Wodarz tabseN	27 - 17	+5.28%	91.8	82.9%	1.36
Can 'kyuubii' Ali kyuubii	30 - 20	+1.24%	87.6	77.1%	1.32

Imperial Valkyries	K - D	Swing	ADR	KAST	Rating2.1
Alexandra 'twenty3' Timonina twenty3	27 - 29	+0.25%	66.7	60.0%	0.90
Ana 'ANa' Dumbravă ANa	17 - 28	-2.22%	66.5	62.9%	0.77
Kamen 'bubble' Kostadinov bubble	17 - 31	-7.94%	61.8	60.0%	0.64
Zainab 'zAAz' Turkie zAAz	13 - 30	-3.53%	54.4	48.6%	0.51
Katarína 'Kat' Vašková Kat	12 - 30	-8.20%	42.3	57.1%	0.47

Nice try and keep grinding ladies, respect

2025-01-30 20:46

damn that was so unexpected

well, many people were expecting 0 rounds versus some of the best teams in the world, still an achievement in my books

2025-01-30 20:47

3 replies

Yes, well done to the ladies. I will remember their highlights, the first that comes into mind being that Deagle clutch on mirage.

2025-01-30 20:55

1 reply

w0nderful was absolutely rekt there

2025-02-01 12:20

also with no captain. I have watched game, calls were wors than versus navi

2025-01-31 14:46

No Tory no win

2025-01-30 20:52

"Obviously there is a huge difference," Ana "⁠ANa⁠" Dumbravă said about playing at an event with the prestige of Katowice despite winning multiple Impact trophies." Wasnt this the same girl who used her number 1 position in the world among girls at X because they deserve to play against males?

2025-01-30 20:53

bro save this spot for a tier two team... Imperial Fe is ACC no that good

2025-01-31 00:30

wow finally some non cinema games against joke team at lan no way

Equal pay is so absurd

2025-01-30 20:58

2 replies

i do wonder how much they are getting paid

2025-01-30 21:11

Nowhere near equally. Which is fair. But yeah no way they are paid similarly to men. There's simply not enough lying to investors possible to be done to generate enough money in women's cs to match the already overinflated salaries of male cs.

2025-01-31 07:34

The first game against FURIA was pretty good for the expectations, in this one they got eaten up. Lots of improvement to make, but i'd say the future is brighter than darker

Oh no! Anyway... Passion UA or even fnatic deserved this invite more. This was expected from the day they were announced at Kato. Propaganda

2025-01-30 21:10

"promising" 1 goodish map against furia :/

2025-01-30 21:12

Hopefully this was the last time they were ever invited to a tier1 tournament

2025-01-30 21:16

Start practicing against male teams, compete in cct's or other t3 tournaments. Grind and then we then we can talk

2025-01-30 21:31

5 replies

they play against Jame's Parivision tomorrow, and they're all still competing in ESEA Main

2025-01-30 21:45

Good to hear it, i wish good luck to them and all women's team everything that makes esports get closer to normal sport is good

2025-01-30 21:46

they ff'd

2025-01-30 22:51

getting prizemoney and invites because of ur gender is the easier way tho, grinding for years day after day, like every team has ever done, takes a long time and hard work.

2025-01-30 22:50

goated name

2025-01-31 20:31

This is their real level. Tier 2 teams would never throw unlike tier 1 teams like navi

2025-01-30 21:43

I would agree wholeheartedly if the visa thing hadn't ruined it all. these matches with the coach standing in mean absolutely nothing, unfortunately.

2025-01-31 02:28

bro +bubble was literally a buff wdym

2025-01-31 08:55

how would you measure that? surely Imp fe looked best vs. Navi, with tory (sample size: 2 maps). Now in Kato they look worse, with bubble (sample size: 4 maps). So if you want to be pretend-objective about it you would have to assume they are better as a team with tory. Of course in reality Navi just trolled and the first map of Furia was a troll as well. The only match I can take seriously is vs. BIG because it was elimination.

2025-01-31 12:55

twenty3 is very consistent, zAAz and ANa with higher peaks. All good players tbh.

The woman hating is strong on this site.

2025-01-31 00:12

No woman hating. Just pure cs analysis. They can't compete at this level

2025-01-31 02:19

Yeah, but it was expected. Them magically come now against tier1 and start winning? It was never gonna happen. But they showed they can compete against male teams, just have to start grinding against tier2.5

2025-01-31 07:55

They can compete? Not a single map?

2025-01-31 12:45

This is good start. I am expecting more IMperial Fe team appearance in upcoming tier 1 event.

2025-01-31 01:40

They should have started with Yalla or CCT tournaments at the begining,it was pretty harsh to send them to T1 tournaments in row. Im still proud of how they played without Tory against Navi and Furia.

2025-01-31 01:47

4 replies

The match against Na'Vi was played at full strength, man (with tory) as it was online: hltv.org/matches/2378215/natus-vincere-v..

2025-01-31 01:52

Taking 7-8 rounds from Navi and make them choke at some even limited times is pretty precious for ladies. I strongly believe that they can take their wins against T2-3 male teams

2025-01-31 01:58

I mean. Navi looked like they were plugging. But yeah, they can beat t3 and some t2 maybe soon

2025-01-31 02:21

Yes, if they want to prove themselves, they have to play CCT or Yalla or ESEA leagues. Valve must not give valve raking points from female tournaments, but nobody restricts women to play CCT, Yalla, ESEA, etc... I am happy to see female teams in T1 tournaments if they proved their skill on "open" tournaments.

2025-01-31 10:40

Sad for tory :(

2025-01-31 02:33

What was promising about their start? They didn't win a map 😂

2025-01-31 02:35

OT vs Furia was a pretty promising start? Dont get the hate :)

2025-01-31 07:54

fraudNa

2025-01-31 05:48

I love that every even non-hating comment that doubts how promising this start really was got deleted overnight. Good job hltv

2025-01-31 06:01

Hyping up these results is cringe and condescending to women in my opinion. "Oh its okay you played like ass, we expected it actually! Its a great start!" Especially with Ana. "Oh the 3 time in a row number 1 female player in the world has yet to play even one series since bounty where she plays to a mediocre level, let alone a good one, forget a good level, simply playing to a mediocre level would be nice because currently she cant hit the broad side of a barn with a shotgun from 2 meters away. well.... it was impressive for her first two tier 1 tournaments!" Like no it wasn't. And saying it was is condescending. I really hope these girls come back with some better form at some point And pop off. Twenty3 popped off pretty well considering her role, but zaaz and then ESPECIALLY Ana really left alot to be desired. Their actual gameplans are alright enough. And one of their glue player seems pretty legit. So if their 2 stars can actually perform this team will be one that can actually win a tier 1 series here n there. Atleast some maps. Minus this big result, they played very well for a team where their 2 stars are missing and one of tournaments they're using their coach instead of a stand in. But the coach thing only excuses 1 match. As big is too big of a loss no pun intended. So that 2 star issue is the real issue. And its not a given that they'll eventually acclimatize, so I hope that eventually happens. Otherwise they'll simply lack the firepower to do anything with their 2 stars underperforming so severely. Astralis doesn't even look like a real team half the time but staehr and dev1ce are consistently performing well. 2 entirely missing STAR players is a huge deal. And jabbi and stavn aren't on a milk carton missing anywhere near as much zaaz and especially Ana. I'm harping on zaaz perhaps a bit too much , she did alright when you consider every bit of context. She didn't do good persay but she did alright, akin to twenty3. Ana though is a crazy drop off. She truly looks like she doesn't belong in anyway shape or form. The nerves must be hitting her like a freaking train

2025-01-31 08:01

I really think that the nerves got the better of them. When Ana started playing with confidence towards the end of Mirage vs. Furia she was looking really good. Not saying that they would be T1 level with more confidence, but I think they would definitely not perform this poorly.

2025-01-31 13:48

hltv seriously deleted my comment where i was saying that "doing great" is a questionable statement and everyone would laugh at a male team while losing 4-13. how is that against any rules of comments?

2025-01-31 08:08

That's why E-sports must be separated. Girls either can't be taken seriously or are praised undeservedly. They are never considered as equal rivals, can say sh!t and get away with it.

2025-01-31 09:06

The problem isn't them being treated equally. The problem is them being treated unequally. They are getting invites to big events for free because they farm women only tournaments all year. If they were treated equally, then none of them would even be there without the grind tier 2 teams have to make in order to get into those tournaments. Also, if they were treated equally by the community, then there wouldn't be any praise for teams that can't win a single map and yet still get invites to tier 1 events, just like some partner teams got mocked consistently and universally in the past for showing up in events with completely washed teams with no results and free invites.

2025-01-31 13:15

it didn't fit the narrative, you must cherrish every moment of FE teams on screen for the sake of women in esports, and create threads about how we can make our game more inclusive

2025-01-31 09:14