Manchester City Esports clinch Fortnite Championship Series 2024
28 February 2024
Back in 2008, the state of the United Arab Emirates, represented by the Abu Dhabi United Group (ADUG), paid in excess of £ 200 million for football club Manchester City. Since then, backed by investments from the United Arab Emirates, the illustrious club has been one of the dominant sides in the English Premier League, while also making waves in European football.
About eight years after the acquisition of Manchester City FC, the Abu Dhabi United Group decided it was time to get into the world of esports in the UK and worldwide, as well. Manchester City Esports naturally started with a FIFA team in 2016 and introduced a Fortnite team three years later. It was this Fortnite team that booked the organisation’s first major success last weekend, by winning the Major 1: Europe of the Fortnite Championship Series (FNCS) 2024.
Fortnite Championship Series 2024
The Fortnite Championship Series 2024 was the 18th edition of the series and consisted of three splits, those being Major 1, Major 2 and Major 3. The Major 1: Europe took place online on Saturday, February 24th, and Sunday, February 25th, and was organised by BLAST and the game’s developer Epic Games. It featured twelve games in total with six games per day and points multiplied by 1.5x on Sunday. The total prize pool for the event was set at $ 880.000.
Back to Manchester City Esports, whose team consisted of Joshua “Cold” Butler and Abdullah “Acorn” Akhras. The team hit the ground running at FNCS 2024 as they aimed to finish as high up the leaderboard as possible on day one. They eventually achieved a very impressive 21 eliminations and one victory royale, which allowed them to start in third place on day two with 305 points in total, just 15 points behind the top spot.
“Cold” on fire
As soon as the second day of the FNCS 2024 got underway, Man City Esports simply continued where they had left off, bullying opponents and dominating scorelines. They added another 31 eliminations and 2 victory royales to their totals, which was enough for them to grab first place. This meant $ 140.000 in prize money for “Cold” and “Acorn”, as well as a starting ticket for the Fortnite Championship Series Global Championship 2024, which is set to take place in Copenhagen (Denmark) on September 7th and 8th, 2024. The winner of this event is considered the new Fortnite world champion.
Out of the two Manchester City players, it was “Cold” who managed to grab most of the spotlight, thanks to an incredible run over two days. The 16-year-old American, who only joined Manchester City Esports a few days before the impressive triumph at FNCS 2024, absolutely dominated the leaderboard with a total of 898 points. That was no less than 177 points more than second-placed PeterBot and Pollo. On top of that, it was his second major victory in less than half a year, as he also crowned himself Chapter 4 Season 1 FNCS champion back in October of last year.