Liquid drop out of second major tournament in a week
Team Liquid's Counter-Strike 2 squad has dropped out of its second major tournament contention in the qualifying stage. Despite assembling a roster of top players, the project has failed to bring results, with voices emerging calling for the roster to be shaken up again.
Liquid drops out at BLAST Premier Spring
Already on its last chance at qualifying for the Blast Premier Spring Finals in London this June, Team Liquid's star-studded roster has failed to qualify for the event, losing to the Portuguese organisation SAW during the Spring Showdown.
In a best-of-three match that went the distance, Liquid had to give the series lead to SAW on Nuke, losing 10-13 in relatively close fashion before equalising the score on Inferno. On the final map, Ancient Liquid were run over, losing 3-14 without ever having a say in the map.
Especially Latvian player Mareks "YEKINDAR" Gaļinskis had a weak series, ending the match at -20 K/D differential. Over the last couple of weeks, the entry fragger had struggled to find value in the new line-up, consistently failing to hit the form he had shown in previous Liquid formations that he has played with ever since joining the team in 2022.
One, two punch
Dropping out of the BLAST Premier Spring competition is only the second most devastating loss that Team Liquid have sustained this week. On March 4, Liquid failed to qualify for the PGL CS2 Major Copenhagen through the Americas RMR, losing to both FURIA and Complexity.
While weaknesses in the format had been pointed out not least by Team Liquid's very own Casper "cadiaN" Møller, the projected ceiling for the roster based on their on-paper-strength should've allowed them to get past the two squads they ended up losing against.
The Americas were given five qualifying slots for the Major, with the international team having to play arguably the two strongest competitors at the RMR to land just outside in 6th-8th place. Team Liquid's performances have cleared their calendar of top-tier competitions as they are also dropping down the ladder of the ESL World Rankings, a metric by which most of the invites will be handed out for IEM Cologne.
Currently sitting in 40th place in the world rankings and fifth in NA, the implied points gathered from the events they failed to qualify on might put the team in a rough spot for the remainder of the year. Fortunately, it has qualified for the IEM Dallas in May, an event that also rewards the winner with a spot at the Cathedral of Counter-Strike.
For the upcoming Skyesports Masters and the ESL Pro League, the team will have to put on their A-game if they are looking to save its competitive calendar for the rest of the year. The roster has approximately four weeks to prepare for the former event. So far, no roster changes have been announced or rumoured.
