Alliance stun FaZe 2-0 in FISSURE Playground 3 opener

Esports News UK, Senior Editor

Last Updated: 08/09/2026

FaZe’s opening match at FISSURE Playground 3 ended in a 2-0 defeat to Alliance, sending the tournament favourites straight into the lower bracket in Suzhou, China. Dust2.us described it as a result that leaves FaZe’s run at the event already under threat.

HLTV, which also covered the match, noted that Alliance were returning after almost two months of inactivity and did so “with a bang”. The Swedish side, ranked outside the top 20 on VRS, took the opening pistol on their pick of Ancient before a back-and-forth first half saw the score tied 6-6.

Alliance won the second pistol too and closed out the map 13-9, despite a 26-kill outing from FaZe’s Russel “Twistzz” Van Dulken. On Nuke, FaZe failed to win either pistol round, even holding a 3v1 advantage in the second, but clawed their way back to level things at 10-10 thanks to a strong round from Ryan “Neityu” Aubry.

Overtime looked likely until Jonatan “bobeksde” Persson closed it out with a four-kill round on match point, sealing a 13-11 win for Alliance and completing the 2-0 sweep.

Simon “twist” Eliasson finished as Alliance’s top performer with a 1.34 rating, while Persson posted a 1.31 rating and 40 kills across the two maps. For FaZe, Twistzz led the way with a 1.22 rating, but the rest of the roster, including Jason “JBOEN” Boe Nielsen, David “frozen” Čerňanský and Jakub “jcobbb” Pietruszewski, all posted negative kill differentials.

The defeat drops FaZe into the lower bracket at FISSURE Playground 3, where they will face magic in their next match. Alliance’s win marks a strong return to competitive play after their spell out of action.

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Esports News UK, Senior Editor

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