blameF 30-bombs Vitality on decider as Astralis move on to BLAST Showdown final

The hometown favorites keep the dream of qualifying for the Royal Arena alive.

Astralis defeated Vitality in a three-map series, coming back after losing Nuke (12-16) by dominating Dust2 (16-9) and Inferno (16-8). The Danish squad put together a good team performance on the first two maps, but it was Benjamin "⁠blameF⁠" Bremer who got his team a comfortable victory on Inferno with a sensational deciding map display, putting up 30 kills and 138 ADR.

Astralis have now booked their spot in the BLAST Showdown final, where they will be facing the winner of the match between Sangal and HEROIC for a spot at the Fall Final on Sunday at 19:30 .

Vitality will be disappointed with the result, the No.1 ranked team in the world bowing out in the semifinals as the pre-event favorites. Their focus now switches to the IEM Rio Major, where they begin their journey against Imperial in the Challengers Stage.

"Qualifying for the BLAST Final was a goal for us," Dan "⁠apEX⁠" Madesclaire said in an interview on the broadcast after losing the match. "This bootcamp has been kinda tough, because we want to both prepare for the Major and also preparing for the Showdown, so that was quite hard for us."

"That wasn't what we looked for at this tournament for sure, but now the Major is coming and that's the biggest goal for us."

The semi-final started on Astralis's map pick of Nuke, where Vitality got off to a 4-0 start on their defense. The Danes quickly answered back with a four-round streak and put together a dominant T side after that. Vitality won just two more rounds in the half as they were outmaneuvered by Lukas "⁠gla1ve⁠" Rossander's calling, the halftime score 9-6 in the favor of the Danes.

A quad-kill by Lotan "⁠Spinx⁠" Giladi won his team the second pistol round, with the reigning EPL champions getting within one round of their opponents. The score remained close for the next few, with both teams winning rounds from disadvantageous situations. A post-plant triple by Emil "⁠Magisk⁠" Reif saved Vitality and got them 14-12 up, running away with the game after that to close out 16-12 and move the series to their map pick of Dust2.

Astralis began the second map in hot form, racing to an 8-0 lead on their defense before Vitality back with a B attack. The sole round win didn't do much to change the fortunes of the European combine, as they found themselves 12-3 behind at the interval. A second-half pistol win for Astralis almost guaranteed their victory, but Vitality didn't give up and put together a six-round streak to make the score a respectable 16-9.

The series was decided on the classic third map of Inferno, where the Danes put together another dominant first half. They won and converted the pistol to go 5-0 up and never looked like stopping after that, winning the half 12-3. blameF had an astonishing performance despite having a quiet series by his standards up to this point, as he put up 24 kills and 162 ADR at the interval, as well as winning two 1vsx situations.

Vitality answered Astralis's pistol round win with a forcebuy to reduce the deficit slightly, Mathieu "⁠ZywOo⁠" Herbaut even winning a 1vs3 to keep his team in it for a while longer. It wasn't to be for the European combine, as blameF hit 30 kills with a successful B defense to put his team up to match point. Astralis converted and booked their spot in the BLAST Premier Fall Showdown grand final, happening on Sunday at 19:30 .