Astralis had high hopes ahead of the European RMRs for the Copenhagen CS2 Major with its star-studded roster. But the organization will miss out on its third Valve-sponsored tournament in a row after being eliminated in the Last Chance Qualifier.
After going 2-3 in the European RMR B, where Astralis defeated Nexus and Monte but lost to Spirit, Heroic, and ENCE, the Danes dropped to the LCQ. There, a single team out of six can win a single last ticket to the CS2 Major. But dev1ce and his crew won’t be even fighting in the second stage of the LCQ, as they were disqualified by 9Pandas in the first one.
Astralis had a close series against the Russian team. On Overpass, which was their pick, they narrowly lost with a 13-11 scoreline, and hoped to even out the series on Nuke. Unfortunately for them, 9Pandas showed a stellar offensive on the T side, where they gathered a stunning eight rounds. It took them another nine to close out the map with a 13-8 scoreline.
While 9Pandas march forward in the LCQ, where they will face at least one opponent tomorrow, Astralis are out. It’s a major disappointment for the roster who picked up two young stars, stavn and jabbi, in November. None of the new additions showed up in the tournament, though. In the European RMR B, jabbi and stavn both posted a rating below one, according to HLTV.
This will be Astralis’ third Major miss in a row after the team placed 12-14th in RMR events for both BLAST.tv CS:GO Paris Major 2023 and IEM CS:GO Rio Major 2022. The team will have a lot of time to make substantial changes or fix their mistakes, though, with their next pivotal tournament being IEM Chengdu. The Chinese event is scheduled to begin on April 8.
