Rare Atom fall flat in StarLadder Budapest Major 2025 opener
Rare Atom's Major campaign got off to the worst possible start as the Chinese team went down to Imperial in their opening game at the StarLadder Budapest Major 2025 Stage 1. Rare Atom, had the veteran Marek making his Major debut and they almost fought back from a 3-9 score line but eventually fell flat at the very end and now drop to the 0-1 bracket.
Dust2 was the battleground to get the StarLadder Budapest Major 2025 underway for the opening BO1 between Rare Atom and Imperial. Rare Atom's A split backfired in the opening round of the game as noway and chelo kept it clean to hand Imperial a CT side pistol. Imperial kept it clean in the anti-eco and eco round post, with Rare Atom managing to get only a single kill in the opening three rounds. The first gun around of the match saw Rare Atom convert a mid-to-B hit with L1hang's opener being crucial to get Rare Atom on the board. skullz denied ChildKing a 1v2 to have Imperial answer back instantly with a B retake. A Marek double helped Rare Atom get their second, as the Chinese team hit the B site again after a couple of back-to-back retakes from Imperial. Rare Atom found one more round right at the end of the half, somehow making a late A hit work with Tiger and Summer hitting some crucial shots to see them end their T side at 3-9.
A quad kill from Tiger saw Rare Atom pick up a massive pistol. After a nervy win against a scary force buy, Rare Atom kept it clean in the opening couple of gun rounds to tie up the score at 9-9. A Tiger double opener with the AWP saw Rare Atom take the lead before Marek whiffed at Long to see Imperial find footing on their T side. Rare Atom looked like they would hit match point first after a trade of rounds towards the end of the match before a quad kill from chelo saw Imperial convert a mid-to-B hit to hit match point first. A perfectly timed A split saw Imperial steal a 13-11 win despite putting up a shaky T side.
ImperialRare Atom| Imperial |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 3.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Marcelo 'chelo' Cespedes |
24 - 15 | +9 | 98.2 | 79.2% | 1.67 |
| Felipe 'skullz' Medeiros |
20 - 13 | +7 | 76.5 | 83.3% | 1.37 |
| Kaiky 'noway' Santos |
13 - 17 | -4 | 61.7 | 75.0% | 1.05 |
 Santino 'try' Rigal |
19 - 14 | +5 | 71.7 | 75.0% | 0.94 |
| Vinicius 'VINI' Figueiredo |
9 - 16 | -7 | 55.2 | 70.8% | 0.83 |
| Rare Atom |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 3.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Junbing 'Tiger' Zhen |
18 - 18 | +0 | 74.2 | 66.7% | 1.04 |
| Junhao 'ChildKing' Peng |
17 - 16 | +1 | 66.4 | 66.7% | 1.00 |
| Yihang 'L1haNg' Li |
13 - 18 | -5 | 60.1 | 62.5% | 0.99 |
| YuLun 'Summer' Cai |
15 - 16 | -1 | 73.0 | 58.3% | 0.91 |
 Tzu-Chi 'Marek' Huang |
12 - 17 | -5 | 63.1 | 79.2% | 0.87 |
Also read
