Wildcard bomb out of Birch Cup following losses to Phantom, Betclic Apogee
Yesterday Wildcard bombed out of Birch Cup 2025, exiting the event in the Open Qualifier stage after back-to-back losses to Phantom and Betclic Apogee, two Polish squads ranked outside of the Top 75 in the Valve Regional Standings (VRS). The team's early exit from Birch Cup comes at a terrible time for Wildcard as they are chasing a spot in the StarLadder Budapest Major, with the team losing valuable points after the losses in Gdańsk.
Wildcard's run at Birch Cup began with a somewhat wobbly 13-10 win over MOUZ NXT on Nuke, with Love "phzy" Smidebrant needing to go huge to drag the team over the line.
This was followed up by a showdown against Polish squad Phantom, who featured familiar names like Mateusz "TOAO" Zawistowski abd Hubert "szejn" Światły. Despite the massive difference in the team's rankings, things did not go well for Wildcard on Nuke as a great performance from Maciej "F1KU" Miklas wasn't enough to force a competitive map, with Phantom securing Nuke 13-7.
PhantomWildcard| Phantom |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 3.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Jakub 'Kunai' Gieremek |
23 - 16 | +7 | 121.4 | 80.0% | 1.63 |
| Brajan 'DGL' Lemecha |
19 - 8 | +11 | 93.3 | 85.0% | 1.30 |
| Aleksy 'Ayteel' Landas |
14 - 12 | +2 | 72.0 | 80.0% | 1.27 |
| Hubert 'szejn' Światły |
13 - 11 | +2 | 75.0 | 80.0% | 1.25 |
| Mateusz 'TOAO' Zawistowski |
6 - 15 | -9 | 48.0 | 70.0% | 0.66 |
| Wildcard |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 3.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Maciej 'F1KU' Miklas |
22 - 16 | +6 | 119.3 | 75.0% | 1.76 |
 Love 'phzy' Smidebrant |
13 - 13 | +0 | 72.0 | 55.0% | 1.12 |
 Peter 'stanislaw' Jarguz |
14 - 15 | -1 | 61.6 | 65.0% | 0.90 |
 Josh 'JBa' Barutt |
9 - 14 | -5 | 52.0 | 60.0% | 0.66 |
| Jaxon 'Peeping' Cornwell |
4 - 17 | -13 | 38.1 | 55.0% | 0.44 |
With their backs against the wall, Wildcard's next game saw them take on top Polish squad Betclic Apogee, with the series starting on the wrong foot as Betclic smashed Wildcard on their map pick, Overpass, with ease taking the map 13-5. Moving onto Ancient, the bad news continued for Wildcard as they conceded a 10-2 lead into an eventual 16-13 overtime loss to see Wildcard exit the tournament.
WildcardBetclic| Wildcard |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 3.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Josh 'JBa' Barutt |
31 - 36 | -5 | 76.2 | 63.0% | 0.95 |
| Maciej 'F1KU' Miklas |
26 - 36 | -10 | 73.7 | 50.0% | 0.84 |
| Peter 'stanislaw' Jarguz |
19 - 35 | -16 | 54.9 | 60.9% | 0.83 |
| Jaxon 'Peeping' Cornwell |
25 - 35 | -10 | 50.9 | 54.3% | 0.76 |
| Love 'phzy' Smidebrant |
22 - 39 | -17 | 57.6 | 50.0% | 0.67 |
| Betclic |
K - D | +/- | ADR | KAST | Rating 3.0 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Patryk 'Melavi' Baranski |
46 - 25 | +21 | 102.8 | 87.0% | 1.55 |
| Adrian 'AdrieN' Mucha |
39 - 24 | +15 | 90.0 | 78.3% | 1.42 |
| Paweł 'dycha' Dycha |
40 - 25 | +15 | 84.7 | 82.6% | 1.33 |
| Patryk 'Demho' Tomaszewski |
30 - 25 | +5 | 75.7 | 76.1% | 1.24 |
| Wojciech 'Prism' Zięba |
24 - 26 | -2 | 59.2 | 73.9% | 0.89 |
While the team's performance left a lot to be desired overall, Jaxon "Peeping" Cornwell in particular had a rough tournament, ending the event with a dismal 0.75 rating.
With Wildcard exiting the LAN, Wildcard's captain Peter "stanislaw" Jarguz made his displeasure about the venue known, telling Jeffrey "Mnmzz" Moore that Birch Cup had extensive issues as well as issues with the chairs, desk, and monitors.
Wildcard will now need to lick their wounds and head over to North America where they are set to compete in Fragadelphia Blocktober. The event will be the team's last chance to secure a spot in the Major, so a deep run is a must when the event kicks off on October 2nd.
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