I still remember the silence in my Discord call when NiP’s PGL CS2 Major Copenhagen European RMR run ended. It was February 2024, and the Ninjas had just finished dead last alongside Into the Breach. I had followed NiP since the GeT_RiGhT and f0rest era, so I told myself it was just another rough patch. But two years later, in 2026, I can see that RMR disaster for what it really was: the final nail in a coffin that had been creaking open for a long time.
According to HLTV reports at the time, NiP planned to bench Kristian k0nfig Wienecke, Patrick es3tag Hansen, and Daniil headtr1ck Valitov. That left Alejandro alex Masanet and Fredrik REZ Sterner as the remaining active players. The org was reportedly committed to building around alex. REZ, who joined in 2017, had dodged the bench again—like a man who keeps missing the last train but somehow always finds a bicycle.
The RMR itself was a slow-motion car crash. I watched NiP face Eternal Fire first and lose 13-11. Then AMKAL took them down. Then SAW finished the job. Here is the table of pain I scribbled into my notes that week:
| Match | Result | What it meant |
|---|---|---|
| Eternal Fire | 13-11 loss | A winnable opener slipped away |
| AMKAL | Loss | The cushion disappeared |
| SAW | Loss | Dead last alongside Into the Breach |
Every team NiP faced at that RMR made it to the PGL CS2 Major Copenhagen 2024. That detail stung more than the losses themselves. It was like watching everyone else board a lifeboat while you’re still arguing about who gets to hold the compass.
On paper, NiP had once sought-after and up-and-coming CS2 players. In practice, the org had not made a dent in any top-tier tournament since going completely international in February 2023—barring one or two solid BLAST Premier performances. The wishy-washy leadership in the roster was one of the biggest issues. Not only did the roster have three IGL changes in the space of a year, but the chopping and changing of Ludvig Brollan Brolin and es3tag from active roster to bench made it no easier. The lineup was a clockwork bird with its gears swapped mid-flight: every new part made the wings beat differently, but it never truly flew.
Benching players became their version of pruning a dying bonsai: they kept cutting, but the roots were drowning. Leadership changed like a language nobody bothered to learn. And the more I watched, the more I suspected the problem was not simply aim or tactics. It was structure. It was trust. It was the absence of a spine that could survive a bad map or a bad month.
The worst part was not the individual losses. It was the pattern. NiP had already been cycling through coaches, IGLs, and role players. Every few months, a new five-man unit appeared with a fresh press release and the same old problems. I wanted to believe in the project. I really did. But by the time the RMR ended, I felt like a fan watching a band replace its drummer, bassist, and singer while insisting the song would sound exactly the same.
Now, in 2026, I look at the wider CS2 scene and see how much has changed. New superteams have risen, the Major circuit has expanded, and the gap between elite and nearly-elite is more punishing than ever. NiP’s 2024 RMR collapse is no longer breaking news, but it remains a case study in how not to rebuild. The org’s player choices and frequent benching over the last few years suggest it might not entirely be the players’ fault. That is the part that haunts me. When a team keeps changing pieces, the constant is the machine around them.
Who knows if those changes helped NiP return to their early 2010s glory. From where I sit in 2026, the answer is still uncomfortable. The Ninjas did not just lose a Major spot; they lost the plot. And I, like many fans, kept watching, hoping the next roster would finally be the one. That hope is a stubborn thing—it survives even when the evidence says otherwise.
So if you ask me what I learned from NiP’s catastrophic CS2 RMR experience, I would say this: talent is not a strategy. A logo is not a culture. And a roster built on panic will always feel like a house with no foundation, no matter how many new windows you install. 🥷💔