Imperial Fe vs. NAVI at BLAST Bounty Breaks a Peak Viewers Record

With 483,696 Counter-Strike 2 (CS2) esports fans tuned in on 16 January 2025 to watch the female squad (Imperial Fe) taking on one of the top three teams, NAVI, in a head-to-head clash at the BLAST Bounty 2025 Season 1 event. 

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That's the all-time record for the most viewers for a female CS team, according to esports charts, who tweeted out the achievement following a match that was not as one-sided as some dinosaurs might expect. Instead, Imperial Fe held its own with impressive vigor.

👑 New ALL-TIME CS RECORD for a female team!

Over 483K Peak Viewers for @imperialesports Valkyries vs @natusvincere at #BLASTPremier Bounty Season 1 2025! pic.twitter.com/OtKXIJ9hPw

— Esports Charts 🇺🇦 (@EsportsCharts) January 16, 2025

This comes just over a week after NAVI dropped the Javelins and left the female competitive CS2 scene! Let that sink in for a moment.

Imperial Fe pulled off some beautiful plays, as you can see from the embedded clip, to score their first round win on Ancient.

NAVI ended up winning the series 2-0 and moving on. However, there were glimmers of hope that Imperial Fe and other female teams would be well-suited to compete in the main tournaments such as BLAST Bounty, Katowice, and more.

The final map scores were:

• NAVI 13 Imperial Fe 7 (Ancient)
• NAVI 13 Imperial Fe 8 (Mirage)

I hope to see more female teams make their way through qualifiers and into main events or rank high even on the Valve Global Standings to earn a direct invite.

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