The favourites had a rough time in the opening day of the play-in portion of the event.

It was a busy day of games on the opening day of V4 Future Sports Festival, with fans treated to four best-of-ones and two best-of-threes as the play-in stage got underway.

First up, one of the favourites to advance to the main event SINNERS took on huge underdogs ONYX, and we were in for a surprise result very early in the tournament. ONYX took a shocking victory off the back of an impressive AWPing performance from Aleksa "⁠Impulse⁠" Stankić, besting SINNERS 16-11 on Inferno, one of the Czech team’s better maps.

Next in group A we saw AGO facing off against eSuba, and once again it was not the result many predicted. It took them an overtime to get it done, but eSuba took Nuke 19-16 against the Polish squad, with another AWPer stealing the show in the form of Dominik "⁠Blogg1s⁠" Janita; he posted a mind-boggling 45 frags on his way to a 1.89 rating.

This meant that two of the highest rated teams in the play-in were made to battle it out in an elimination best-of-three, SINNERS and AGO. It ended up being a fairly straightforward affair for the Czech roster as they picked up a 2-0 victory, taking AGO’s pick of Ancient 16-11 before crushing them 16-7 on Inferno.

The usual suspects of Adam "⁠NEOFRAG⁠" Zouhar and Tomáš "⁠oskar⁠" Šťastný did the heavy lifting for SINNERS, whereas it was quiet on the fragging front all around for the Poles.

Day two will see eSuba face ONYX for a spot at the main event. The loser of that game will get a second chance, and will battle it out with SINNERS on day three to decide the other qualifier from group A.

Over in group B it was Fiend and Budapest Five who initiated proceedings, and yet again we were graced with an upset, albeit with the Bulgarian squad playing with Georgi "⁠SHiPZ⁠" Grigorov standing in for Viktor "⁠v1c7oR⁠" Dyankov. Mirage was the scene for this one, Budapest Five being powered to a 16-13 victory by Kornél "⁠kory⁠" Szedlár’s 100 ADR performance.

The second game in group B saw Wisla Krakow take on Enterprise, and although the Polish squad may house some more recognisable names, only four spots separate the two teams in the HLTV rankings, #58 and #54 respectively.

For the first time so far at V4 the higher ranked team won the game, with Enterprise taking Ancient 16-10, a messy game going the way of the Slovak-Czech mix by virtue of a strong carry performance from Erik "⁠The eLiVe⁠" Sith.

Of course that left the group B elimination match, which was to be contested by Fiend and Wisla Krakow, and the two teams gave us a back-and-forth series .

Dust2 was taken 16-13 by the Poles, just about doing enough on their CT side to stop the Bulgarians after what seemed a convincing 10-5 T half. Tomasz "⁠phr⁠" Wójcik was the standout player for Wisla Krakow, but Hristiyan "⁠REDSTAR⁠" Pironkov was the best player on the server, even in defeat.

Inferno went to Fiend 16-12, relying on their tendency to grab the opening frag to carry them over the line. This time it was Deyvid "⁠h4rn⁠" Benchev who went above and beyond for Fiend.

By this point, late on in what was a long day, the series had descended into a messy affair, with both teams making mistakes and losing to eco rounds or half-buys.

Overpass was another close, chaotic battle, with both teams having chances to take the map by the scruff of the neck and failing to do so. In the end the extra fragging power of the Bulgarian side prevailed, h4rn once again leading the way, as it finished 16-14.

Day two will feature Enterprise and Budapest Five fighting for a spot in the main event, with the loser facing Fiend on day three for the last berth available from group B.

The standings after day one are as follows: