Astralis have clinched the second-to-last playoff position at Esports World Cup following a 2-1 series victory against Ninjas in Pyjamas in Group B's lower bracket (13-3 Nuke, 10-13 Inferno, 13-7 Cache).
Rasmus "HooXi" Nielsen's roster brought momentum from their semi-final appearance at BLAST Bounty Season 2 into the Paris event, successfully recovering from an upper bracket loss to Falcons to guarantee their advancement to the bracket stage.
"It's not the limit," HooXi shared with Freya "Freya" Spiers post-match. "We can go way further if we want. It depends on who shows up on the day, if it's the good or bad Astralis, but I think today was good so we'll try to catch the momentum."
The Danish squad dominated NIP's Nuke selection from beginning to end, consistently limiting player losses in winning rounds and controlling opening engagements during an exceptional first half. NIP managed only three rounds before switching sides, including the opening pistol and a converted 3v5 situation, with no improvement on defense.
Astralis claimed the pistol round before Victor "Staehr" Staehr delivered an exceptional 1v4 clutch to counter Roman "n0te" Hamze's Deagle triple during NIP's force-buy attempt. Additional clutches in subsequent rounds sealed Astralis' commanding map win.
NIP responded on Inferno by winning crucial late-round scenarios, with Gytis "ryu" Glušauskas providing a quad kill and 1v2 clutch among Astralis' limited breakthroughs.
NIP built a 7-2 advantage before Astralis executed repeated B-site takes to narrow the deficit, gaining control after winning the pistol round following the swap. Kacper "xKacpersky" Gabara stabilized NIP's performance with critical entries, helping force a Cache decider.
That effort dissolved on the final map as Astralis countered xKacpersky and n0te's opening plays to establish another 6-1 lead. Though NIP recovered late in the half, they couldn't mount a comeback after Jakob "jabbi" Nygaard's pistol round triple secured Astralis' path to victory.
