When the BLAST R6 Major Munich was about to begin, not many people knew what exactly expect from Ninjas in Pyjamas. The expectations around the Brazilians hit rock bottom after their 1-7 defeat against Weibo Gaming, which put their backs against the wall. However, they managed to bounce back as they qualified for the playoffs.
Both Wildcard and the shinobi headed to the playoffs in a similar situation; just a few days ago, most of the viewers didn't really expect them to be on stage today. Unfortunately, the ninjas' miraculous comeback in the Swiss Stage has rapidly been watered down with a harsh 0-2 defeat.
The series got really hilly for the ninjas after a loss on their map pick, Clubhouse. Wildcard absolutely ran over the Brazilians as they won four of their attacks. Eventually, the North Americans stole the ninjas pick with a 7-2 win. The shinobi's backs were between a rock and a hard place, and, in order to force the third map, they would have to beat the North Americans on Kafe Dostoyevsky.
"We were a bit anxious at the start of the game," Gabriel "pino" Fernandes admitted in a post-match interview with SiegeGG. "We executed some of them (attacks) very poorly, we missed some timings, we did it slower than it should. So, that affected us a bit."
"We lost the control of the match. When we switched halves, on defense, we misscomunicated some things again. The first round it was a 4v3 on the Gym and Bedroom bomb site and losing there was awful for our mental, and, yeah, we tried to reset for the second map but we couldn't do it."
Losing Clubhouse the way they did was extremely painful for the Brazilians. Still, they still had one map to make omens with themselves. They needed a good performance as a win on Skyscraper would have sent both teams to Kafe Dostoyevsky, a rock-solid map for the shinobi. It was up to them to not just win to head to Kafe, but also to restore the momentum lost.
In fact, throughout the season, Ninjas in Pyjamas have demonstrated their ability to react even when the game is in a critical condition. They qualified for the BLAST R6 Major Munich after a triple-overtime game against LOS and reached the playoffs after back-to-back overtimes against Team BDS. They could make a comeback.
However, Wildcard quickly put them in an even more complicated position. The Americans' use of Clash on Skyscraper slowed down the ninjas, which looked like they couldn't get back into the game. Logically, the Brazilians ended up getting rid of the shield operator. That's when they bounced back.
"We started to play a little bit more loose, make more plays, and get the opening kills... it worked. We were pretty confident on the decider map, in Kafe we had a really good shot," pino admitted.
"We couldn't convert the last attack. It was a 5v4 and there was a guy on Karaoke, Montagne was trying to kill him, nobody could get the kill. The pressure got us a little bit there. We were really confident with Kafe as the decider so it hurt us a lot."
Logically, following today's defeat, the ninjas will feel hurt. However, looking at the whole event, it's fair to say the team can learn from their Munich experience, especially after a season where the players missed out on all the international events. According to the Brazilian, the season has helped them to be more vocal and be more "free to open, expose their ideas" something that the "last lineups didn't have that mindset."
However, despite revealing improvements compared to previous campaigns, pino also teased some problems that must be tackled urgently – which takes the squad back to South America's Stage 2 playoffs.
"Coming to this event we had some things that... how can I say... since we played the playoffs of the SAL we had some problems that we couldn't talk about it, it affected our preparation for this tournament, so, it was really bad. But, overall in the year I think the main think is what I said... and Dan, as a coach, he was an analyst before, him becoming a coach helped, I think it was one of the main things there."
"I don't know what's going to happen with our line up, right now, as I said, there are some things that have happened, but, yeah, we felt the step up."
Ninjas in Pyjamas' future seems uncertain. What's for sure, though, is that the Brazilians' run in Munich has come to an end and must now focus on the Regional Finals as they will need a good performance there to qualify for the Six Invitational 2026.
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