BLAST partners with WePlay eSports for BLAST Premier 2021/22

Esports media holding WePlay Esports and tournament operator BLAST announced a partnership, where the Ukrainian studio has received exclusive rights to broadcast the series of Premier events in Russian. This cooperation is for two years starting from the 2021 Fall Season of which will last from September 16 till November 28, 2021. The total prize pool of the season will be $1,737,000.

Alexander Lewin, VP of Distribution and Programming for BLAST, said: “We’re delighted to welcome WePlay Esports as our latest broadcast partner – with their extensive expertise in Counter-Strike production, WePlay Esports will help to bring the very best of BLAST Premier to Russia for the remainder of the 2021 season and beyond. BLAST has always enjoyed great support and viewership in the CIS region and we look forward to maintaining our industry-leading esports production and entertainment for the community to enjoy.”

According to the press release from BLAST, WePlay will cover Premier Fall Groups 2021 (September 16-26), Premier Fall Showdown 2021 (October 12-17), Premier Fall Final 2021 (November 24-28), World Final 2021 (December 14-19) and all tournaments in 2022.

“As a tournament operator, we had an experience of both organizing Russian-language coverage of tournaments on our own and involving third-party studios. We’ve noticed that the CIS audience has grown, and its demands for the quality of content have grown, too. Viewers want to see emotional content so that each tournament will be remembered for something special. We drew our conclusions, heard the wishes of the audience, and will do everything in our power so that they no longer have to leave and switch to the English broadcast. After all, no one can cover tournaments that are as bright as BLAST better than WePlay Esports,” — says Maksym Bilonogov, chief visionary officer and general producer at WePlay Esports.