Vitality continue reign of terror, send Astralis to Lisbon lower bracket after cadiaN disasterclass

The Danes fell completely flat against the EPL champions in their BLAST Open Lisbon opener.

Vitality haven't missed a beat between stepping off the podium at ESL Pro League to arriving at the BLAST studio in Denmark, extending their unbeaten series streak to 12 in a row by way of a quick 2-0 over Astralis.

It is anyone's guess whether the Danes were overly confident on Inferno or thought they could punish Vitality on it, but picking the map that apEX's side are now 8-0 on was as wise of a decision as one can imagine.

The map was a disaster for Astralis, who won just four rounds — both pistols, one conversion, and a 1v2 clutch from Victor "⁠Staehr⁠" Staehr — while all of Vitality ended the map with a 1.30 rating or higher.

Dan "⁠apEX⁠" Madesclaire started compiling clips for his second, five-minute trash-talk compilation early into the series, and his jovial banter continued on Dust2.

Staehr was again the man of the hour for Astralis on map two, providing another 1v2 clutch and several multi-kills, but not even the world's strongest man could have done the heavy lifting required to make up for a 1-15 K-D from Casper "⁠cadiaN⁠" Møller.

Mathieu "⁠ZywOo⁠" Herbaut tallied an ace, Robin "⁠ropz⁠" Kool made his teammates moan with a crisp headshot onto Nicolai "⁠device⁠" Reedtz, and Vitality cruised to another victory to send Astralis down to the lower bracket of Group A.

cadiaN's third-worst LAN map of his career still doesn't do justice to his performance

cadiaN ended the series with a 7-28 K-D and 0.45 rating, with his 0.34 on Dust2 becoming the third-worst LAN map in his career (Vitality are also responsible for his second-worst, a 0.31 rating in a 13-0 drubbing at BLAST Fall Final 2024).

His scoreline somehow still doesn't do justice to how woeful he was across the series, missing multiple easy shots and kills that could have given Astralis at least a sliver of a chance.

Astralis in Major danger

The warning claxons should be firing in the Astralis camp, but for a far more consequential reason than a meltdown series out of their captain.

The Danes are currently ranked ninth in Europe on Valve's Regional Standings, sitting just above the tenth-place cut-off for an invite to Stage 2 of the BLAST.tv Austin Major.

Below them sits 3DMAX, GamerLegion, and Virtus.pro, the last of whom Astralis could meet in the Group A lower bracket elimination game should FaZe win their opener.

That specific matchup and a potential last-place exit at BLAST's studios could have huge ramifications for the Danes, with the result likely to drop them below 3DMAX to tenth in Europe.

Should Virtus.pro then manage a decent result in Lisbon, the recalculation of points with any head-to-head results could be just enough to bridge the gap and force Astralis to go through the Europe Major Regional Qualifier instead.

Vitality extend series winstreak to 12

It often takes more titles and time to start conversations about an era, but Vitality already have discussions kicking off about just how far they can go.

The team has dropped just one series since adding ropz at the start of the year, an 0-2 loss in their LAN debut at BLAST Bounty Season 1 Finals, and are 14-1 in series overall.

That record gets even more fearsome when counting maps, which apEX's side have lost only five of and now boast a nigh-unplayable 30-5 W-L.

A 58.6% pistol winrate, 82.9% round two conversion, and a monstrous 37.9% round two break gives teams very few opportunities to take control of a game, and even when they do, a force or half-buy at any point has already been enough for Vitality to get the job done time and time again.