Kassad: "BLAST choose politics over quality" for talent choices

Earlier today, Aleksandar "kassad" Trifunovic tweeted about alleged impropriety in BLAST's selection for talent on their broadcasts. He blamed this on "politics", claiming that it damaged the quality of the broadcast and "disrespected the game and the fans".

kassad, who has been hired as an analyst for IEM Cologne 2023, says that this event is more important than the BLAST.tv Paris Major, the final Major in CS:GO history. It is important to note that kassad has never worked a BLAST broadcast before, according to Liquipedia, and is predominantly a member of ESL's cast, taking the analyst stage for Katowice earlier this year and at the IEM Rio Major near the tail end of last year.

In a follow up Tweet, kassad says he was not referring to himself in these talent discrepancies. Nonetheless, as two of the most prestigious events of the year, Cologne and the Paris Major do have a striking similarity in their talent. Seven of eight Paris Major commentators will be employed at Cologne, with just Anders "Anders" Blume only appearing at the Major (Anders' casting duo Jason "moses" O'Toole will be an analyst at Cologne 2023), making room for James Bardolph and Alex "Hawka" Hawkins.

The analyst desk at Cologne does sport some new faces compared to the Major, with Janko "YNk" Paunović, Sudhen "Bleh" Wahengbam, and kassad himself taking the desk in addition to four faces returning from Paris. In other areas of broadcast, Cologne gains Eefje "Sjokz" Depoortere as an interviewer as well as Tres "stunna" Saranthus and Mike "DarfMike" Winnick as desk hosts. Nonetheless, most of the cast of Cologne had a hand in the broadcast at the BLAST.tv Paris Major.

This is not the first time kassad has criticized the tournament organizer, previously saying it is the "worst TO that we ever had in the circuit."

Below you can see the comparison between the two talent lineups.