Liquid’s Major Hopes in Jeopardy as Ultimate Reacts to Uncertain Cologne Qualification

Team Liquid’s hopes of reaching the IEM Cologne Major are still alive, but the team no longer controls its own fate. After a 7th-8th place finish at DraculaN Season 6 in Romania, Liquid were left waiting on other Americas teams and on the final Valve Regional Standings calculations ahead of the April 6 invite date. In his post-match interview with HLTV, Roland “ultimate” Tomkowiak tried to keep the situation in perspective, saying he would not worry while the outcome remained undecided. 

Liquid’s latest setback came at the end of an exhausting day in which the team had to play three series in a row. According to ultimate, that schedule took a visible toll. He admitted he felt “gassed out” by the end of the day and said he could not perform at his usual level, especially in the last match. His explanation helps frame Liquid’s rough results not only as a tactical or roster issue, but also as a challenge of adapting to the demanding rhythm of smaller VRS-relevant LAN events, where teams may be forced to grind through several matches in a short window rather than play one marquee series per day. 

That context matters because Liquid have spent the last several weeks chasing ranking points wherever they could find them. HLTV had already reported earlier in March that Liquid’s Major chances were slipping, which pushed the team to add smaller LAN tournaments such as Roman Imperium Cup VI and DraculaN Season 6 to their schedule after an early exit from ESL Pro League. The goal was simple: collect enough VRS value before the cut-off. But the campaign produced mixed returns. Liquid finished fourth at Roman Imperium Cup VI, then placed 9th-12th at BLAST Open Rotterdam, and later withdrew from Gamers Assembly while still lacking certainty around their Major status. 

The roster move that brought Mario “malbsMd” Samayoa to Liquid also changed the broader qualification picture. HLTV reported on March 13 that Liquid and G2 swapped malbsMd and NertZ, with the deal carrying VRS implications because it returned Liquid to an American core ahead of the Major cut-off. That regional shift became crucial: instead of fighting in Europe’s deeper and more crowded field, Liquid moved into the Americas race after playing enough matches with the new lineup. As HLTV noted after DraculaN, Liquid entered the Americas VRS once they recorded their fifth match with malbsMd. 

Even so, the change was not an instant fix. In the HLTV interview, ultimate praised malbsMd as “an amazing player” with a high-level understanding of the game and a strong ability to adapt to situations and teammates. But the results in Romania showed that individual quality alone was not enough to solve Liquid’s issues overnight. HLTV explicitly framed the losses to M80 and Sashi at DraculaN as evidence that adding malbsMd would not immediately repair the team’s problems. The event underlined how fragile Liquid’s form still is, especially in tournaments where upsets are common and every VRS point matters. 

What makes the story more dramatic is how narrow the Americas race has become. HLTV’s current projected April 6 Major ranking shows the Americas receiving 10 slots in total, with one direct Stage 3 berth for FURIA, three Stage 2 places for 9z, Legacy, and paiN, and six Stage 1 places for NRG, Sharks, M80, MIBR, Liquid, and BESTIA. In that projection, Liquid sit ninth in the Americas on 1336 points, only 11 points ahead of BESTIA in tenth and outside the safety margin one would normally want heading into the final days. M80 are seventh with 1376 points, also still in the mix but not immune to late movement. 

Other teams’ performances have already shown how quickly the picture can change. HLTV recently highlighted M80 as a team that was well positioned to secure its place, while Voca kept its own Major hopes alive by winning Fragadelphia York and rising into projected invite range at that moment. At the same time, FaZe’s early exit from DraculaN destroyed their qualification chances in Europe, a reminder that one bad event this close to the deadline can erase months of work. Liquid’s situation is therefore not just about their own inconsistency; it is also about surviving a late scramble in which multiple bubble teams are still trying to steal the final available spots. 

There is also a structural reason why this fight has become so intense. ESL confirmed that Major invitations for Cologne will be finalized from the April 6 VRS release, and the tournament organizer previously announced that all 32 teams would be selected through the Valve Regional Standings. Europe received 17 slots for Cologne, the Americas 10, and Asia 5, based on regional performance at the previous Major cycle. That means Liquid’s regional switch gave them a more realistic path, but not an easy one: the Americas allocation is still tight, and the last few spots remain exposed to every small LAN result. 

From a competitive standpoint, ultimate’s comments sound less like denial and more like a player trying to stay functional under uncertainty. He did not dismiss the importance of the Major race; rather, he acknowledged that the final answer was out of Liquid’s hands and that worrying would not change anything. That attitude may be the healthiest one available to a team that is still building around siuhy, EliGE, NAF, ultimate, and the newly arrived malbsMd. But whether calm turns into relief will depend not on rhetoric, but on the final math. As of April 1, Liquid remain inside HLTV’s projected Americas invite zone for Cologne — barely — and their recent results have left them with no cushion at all.