Sometimes, the Last Chance Qualifier can take the sting out of RMRs. It can give undeserving favorites another bite at the cherry.

Not so for Astralis.

They could be forgiven by the kindest of onlookers (if not us) for losing to Spirit and for their mental blocks against Heroic and ENCE.

But their fourth chance was against seized’s 9 Pandas.

The $2 million Danish superteam, against nine fluffy pandas. And you know who wins. The pandas, obviously.

Best part? It wasn’t even close. Astralis were outcalled, outshot, and outbrained. It was embarrassing.

They will now miss their third Major in a row. Astralis stickers haven’t been in the game since Antwerp, when Aleksib was on G2, Boombl4 on NAVI, and NIP was in the top ten.

The first Danish Major, without Astralis, is now a reality.

So what went wrong?

Firstly, the pressure. Astralis looked shell-shocked all week long. jabbi and stavn have crumpled into themselves and you have to be sympathetic, such is the tsunami of hate going their way.

device tweeted saying the game wasn’t fun anymore (which shows), and he and blameF have dropped off of a cliff as well.

Their system (and firepower, somehow) resembles a trashy top-30 international team, not the organisation that once housed the GOAT roster.

Signing ruggah for after the Major, and making poor analyst r0nic stand behind the team here, is also absolutely insane.

The only shining light has been Staehr, who got shafted on the role side and then got sent by blameF and device to do the exit interview with BanKs, too.

The RMR is cruel. But Astralis have zero excuses, they just couldn’t play to the level required for a shot at the Major.