Following a report on Andreas “Xyp9x” Højsleth allegedly going on medical leave, Astralis has confirmed that the player will take a temporary leave from competitive Counter-Strike. To fill his shoes, the team has brought Marco “Snappi” Pfeiffer on board as a stand-in.
Another instance of burnout and stress
Xyp9x takes his leave for the exact same reasons as his teammate, Lukas “gla1ve” Rossander: stress and burnout. In the announcement, Xyp9x said that he has “sadly been feeling burnout/stress symptoms chasing me over many months. […] The time has come to take care of my health and therefore I have given in a sick note to Astralis.”
Kasper Hvidt, the Director of Sports in Astralis Group, has also commented on the matter. He expressed understanding of Xyp9x’s decision, despite the timing not being “optimal.”
Andreas is in the need of a pause from competing. Needless to say, the timing isn’t optimal, but we cannot compromise when it comes to giving the players the best possibilities to maintain a healthy mental balance and to perform in the long term.
The team had to quickly find a replacement for Xyp9x. In gla1ve’s case, Jakob “JUGi” Hansen was ready to take his place, as he had come on board as the seventh member of the Astralis roster. This time, they turned to Snappi.
Snappi comes to the rescue
According to the previous report, Astralis had inquired about Jonas “Lekr0” Olofsson. They also looked into Patrick “es3tag” Hansen, who is due to join Astralis in the beginning of July. Both deals, apparently, did not work out. This led to Snappi becoming the player to temporarily replace Xyp9x on the Danish CSGO powerhouse.
As Patrick @es3tag Hansen will only join the team in July, we are happy that Marco @SnappiCSGO Pfeiffer has agreed to step in immediately.#ToTheStars pic.twitter.com/zC3rqYqwgk
— Astralis Counter-Strike (@AstralisCS) May 28, 2020
Astralis will now play without both gla1ve and Xyp9x at BLAST Showdown from June 1 until June 7. The remaining core trio of Astralis includes Emil “Magisk” Reif, Peter “dupreeh” Rasmussen, and Nicolai “dev1ce” Reedtz. The event will show whether Astralis can play to the best of their ability without two of their core players on the team.
What do you think of Snappi replacing Xyp9x on Astralis? Let us know your thoughts down in the comments. As always, remember to follow us at Daily Esports for all your latest news in CSGO as well as other major esports out there.
