New year, same culprits: Aurora and Astralis show the more things change, the more they stay the same at BLAST Bounty

Far too often, Counter-Strike teams see the solution to their ongoing woes as being to dip into the transfer market and freshen things up a little. It’s a world where rosters fall apart with regularity, teams rarely given the appropriate amount of time to make a success of a project in a game where fluidity is arguably as important as anything else.

In the recent offseason, Astralis and Aurora were two such teams. Both made changes to their lineup, albeit with very different approaches. But at BLAST Bounty Season 1 2026, both teams failed to make it to the LAN portion of the event, a torrid start for both teams. For context, Astralis and Aurora were both at the LAN of the last BLAST Bounty in August, a symbolic representation of how they have immediately gotten worse as a result of their changes.

But why was this the case? Let’s take a look at both teams and the problems we saw at BLAST Bounty to see if we can get to the root cause of all of this.

Astralis sold its soul for this?

For national teams, going international is sort of the point of no return. Competitively, it’s almost guaranteed to make you more competitive in the long run, given you’re no longer restricted to a small pool of players. But when you’re the national team like Astralis were, their identity so rooted in their Danish heritage, going international means a little more. It’s the selling of your soul. If you’re going to do it, you have to go big to make it worthwhile.

So when Astralis unveiled the signings of ryu and phzy, it was hard not to feel a sense of disappointment. Really? With all due respect to both, who may well work out as successes for Astralis, but they certainly don’t move the needle. And something did need to change for Astralis, given how last year ended. But this felt like a move borne of financial necessity, rather than a real commitment to being competitive long term. At that point, why not take a chance on two Danish talents? If they don’t work out, at least you have your identity intact for a little longer yet. But this? Now you have a Frankenstein’s monster of a roster that no one in Denmark really cares for anymore, and you’re still bad. Oops.

While ryu and phzy were both impressive in Astralis’ BLAST Bounty Season 1 2026 opener against Fnatic, their limitations were laid bare a little clearer against PARIVISION. A 0.75 rating for ryu and a 0.53 rating for phzy left them battered and bruised in the first event, failing to qualify for the LAN finals. Given it’s their first event, it’s difficult to be too harsh on them, but right now it just feels like Astralis have sold their soul and managed to get worse in one fell swoop. Things might get worse before they get better.

Aurora change doesn’t solve the real underlying issue

Aurora’s change saw the opposite of Astralis, a complete adherence to national identity regardless of the quality coming in. jottAAA was out, seemingly self-benched by all accounts. He was replaced by soulfly from Fire Flux, who, throughout 2025, played just 14 maps against top 30 opponents, with a rating of 0.93 in that time. To ask him to dive headfirst into Tier 1 without the stats to suggest he’s capable of making the jump is a little wild, but if Aurora were to stay all-Turkish, any jottAAA replacement was always going to be difficult.

Ultimately, soulfly’s BLAST Bounty debut was something of a mixed bag. A winning start against HOTU covered up his difficult first match, putting up just 27 kills across three maps. But in the follow-up loss against GamerLegion, soulfly put up a team-best rating of 1.04, where the rest of his teammates floundered. Not exactly massive numbers, but enough to suggest that he won’t always be a liability.

But really, Aurora’s change simply didn’t address the real pressing need for this roster: leadership. jottAAA was a fine player for his roles, and it has been clear for a while that Aurora are simply out of ideas. It felt as though belief in MAJ3R hit an all-time low at the end of 2025, leading most to believe his time on the team was done. But a lack of Turkish IGLs meant he has kept his place in the hotseat for 2026, and current evidence suggests that very little has changed.

It does feel as though Aurora still need that leadership change. They may already have their next fall guy set up in soulfly, but even pinning the blame on him next time they want to make a change won’t solve the real problems with this roster. The Turkish IGL situation makes it difficult, but it may reach a real boiling point if results don’t rapidly improve.