Astralis stun NAVI en route to PGL Astana 2025 semis

Counter-Strike

May 16, 2025

Leonardo Biazzi

Astralis have booked a spot in the semifinals of PGL Astana 2025 this Friday, May 16, after a surprising 2-1 victory over NAVI in the quarterfinals.

The Danes weren’t considered the favorites by any means, as not only had the Astralis organization been going through financial turmoil, but the results were abysmal before Rasmus “HooXi” Nielsen took over the in-game leadership responsibilities for the Kazakhstani event.

HooXi, however keeps, surprising just about everybody and showing that this Astralis lineup can compete against the very top CS2 teams in the world. The former G2 IGL guided Astralis to their first playoff appearance since PGL Cluj-Napoca in February. At the moment, nobody can rule out Astralis from completing this Cinderella run at PGL Astana and winning the whole thing.

Astralis outplay NAVI in PGL Astana 2025 quarterfinals

Astralis Staehr talks to stage host BanKs after beating NAVI in the quarterfinals of PGL Astana 2025. Image via PGL

If we disregarded Mirage, which was NAVI’s map pick, Astralis were in control of the whole series. The Danes showed that they’re a revitalized team, especially on Nuke, when they didn’t crumble under the pressure and forced overtime.

High-stakes moments like this exposed the old lineup’s cracks. However, with HooXi at the helm, Astralis pushed through and secured the victory on Nuke, their map pick, off the back of a huge collective effort nonetheless. Everybody on Astralis fragged well, while only Mihai “iM” Ivan finished with a positive K/D on NAVI.

NAVI tied the series after Mirage and left everything open for Ancient. Most CS2 fans expected a lot of back-and-forth in the final map, but instead they witnessed sheer Astralis dominance from the get-go as they dismantled NAVI’s defense to win their T side by 8-4.

Victor “Staehr” Staehr, one of Astralis’ riflers, was particularly unstoppable on Ancient, and he kept finding frags in the second half, helping Astralis to comfortably beat NAVI by 13-6 and advance to the PGL Astana 2025 semis. Staehr topped the scoreboard with 18 kills, but everybody on Astralis contributed in the fragging department.

Astralis will play Aurora tomorrow, May 17 to decide who advance to the grand finals of PGL Astana 2025 on Sunday.

What does this loss to Astralis mean to NAVI?

jL laments a round NAVI lost to Astralis at PGL Astana 2025. Image via PGL

While Astralis are living a special moment, the same can’t be said about NAVI. The team have repeatedly failed to reach the same heights they reached last year, when they most notably won the PGL Copenhagen Major.

PGL Astana 2025 is the fourth tournament in a row that NAVI fell before the semifinals, so unless Aleksi “Aleksib” Virolainen and co. manage to turn things around at the BLAST.tv Austin Major in June, the organization will most likely make roster changes for the half second of 2025.

If that’s the case, NAVI will have a lot of thinking to do, as every player on the roster is underperforming in comparison to 2024. Many have criticized Ihor “w0nderful” Zhdanov for his lack of impact with the AWP compared to other top AWPers like Mathieu “ZywOo” Herbaut and Ilya “m0NESY” Osipov.