CDL Champs Day Three – Falcons Steal The Hearts As Old Flames Locked In For Finals

The stakes have been ramped up as CDL Champs day three continued to steal hearts, break hearts, and deal up two Ace of hearts as only a pair of iconic Call of Duty franchises remain.

After a rollercoaster opening two days saw second-favourites LA Thieves get stunned by resurgent mid-pack teams, the top six teams were whittled down further as four rosters faced elimination on the most decisive day of the tournament so far.

Crowd favourites emerged, bitter defeats were dished out, and OpTic and FaZe booked their spot in the Call of Duty League 2026 Grand Finals.

CDL Champs Day Three Recap

Falcons become people’s champion before heartbreak ensued

So far this season, Team Falcons have been the same old disappointing ‘superstar-backed’ team, relying on their flagship players to pop off at any given moment. But that flawed recipe was met with disappointment time and time again. That was until six days before the World Championships as they finally decided to take a risk with a roster move.

The momentum of bringing in Mohammed “Alluka” Bindal on loan from FaZe catapulted the Falcons into an entirely new team, as they originally shocked LA Thieves and set up an upper bracket round against FaZe. Ultimately, FaZe proved too coordinated, but a lower bracket run was still on the cards.

CDL Champs day three belonged to Falcons, as they found red-hot form off the back of an animalistic Saud “Exnid” Al-Ati. Often criticised as the weak link for Falcons, the Saudi player has spent all year incrementally improving, and his peak form came out in back-to-back wins against Miami Heretics and, most importantly, Paris Gentle Mates.

• Miami Heretics 0 – 3 Riyadh Falcons

It was that latter match where Falcons proved to be the people’s champions as the plucky underdogs refused to lie down and stayed in touching distance with Gentle Mates until the dying embers when they clutched up with a 6-4 win on Search and Destroy to secure a top three finish.

• Paris Gentle Mates 2-3 Riyadh Falcons

A third game proved to be too much as OpTic Texas recovered in the lower bracket and continued their Hardpoint dominance to prove too hot for Falcons, who fell out of the tournament in third, but with the respect of the league. Alluka is on the map, Exnid has emerged, and the stalwarts Matthew “KiSMET” Tinsley and McArthur “Cellium” Jovel proved that they can still compete at the very highest level.

• OpTic Texas 3 – 1 Riyadh Falcons

OpTic and FaZe will dance for greatness

Elsewhere at CDL Champs day three, FaZe Vegas drew first blood against OpTic Texas in the upper bracket finals, as the hosts’ Search and Destroy proved to be too strong. Dubbed as the series of the season, especially with the 245-250 opening Hardpoint, FaZe came out with the bragging rights, although a rematch is most certainly on the cards.

• OpTic Texas 2 – 3 FaZe Vegas

The only other game was earlier in the day as G2 Minnesota were defeated by Paris Gentle Mates in a very menial and straightforward display, although both sides would end their Champs run in the opening hours of the day.

For both teams, the season ends where they would have expected, but