In an event that saw favorites topple like dominos,
Mate y Tapa came out on top of the
European Last Chance Qualifier (LCQ) to claim the final spot at the 2026
Rocket League World Championship
. Lautaro Francisco
"ajg" Gusinsky, Sergio
"AtomiK" Pérez Cortés, and Ivan
"Dorito" Ruiz Jiménez will each make their first LAN appearance of the season in Fort Worth, with ajg and Dorito breaking three- and two-year long RLCS LAN droughts, respectively.
The Spanish-Argentinian roster will enter the event as underdogs to make it out of the Play-In, where they will begin against SSA’s top seed Five Fears before a likely matchup against North American #4 Virtus.pro will send one of the two teams through to the Group Stage.
Weathering the storm
Mate y Tapa’s talent level and Split 2 performance placed them behind Kaydop Corp (Joyo, Radosin, Rezears), Geekay Esports (Alpha54, mtzr, TempoH), and NOVO Esports (GiuK, Nico, rehzzy) heading into the LCQ, as well as being about on level footing with newly formed Magnolia (rise., Toxiic, yujin).
Despite the struggles that several expected Top 16 teams faced in the Swiss Stage, Mate y Tapa went through at 3-1, with a 1-3 defeat to Kaydop Corp the only blemish on their record. The GSL Stage would look just as comfortable, with back-to-back 3-1 victories over Chippy Chips (Chippy/Rebmob/ThO.) and PCS Stride (Mat./Mozzarella/Smokez) securing their spot in the upper bracket of the Playoffs. At the same time, tournament favorites Geekay Esports and NOVO Esports both crashed out of the tournament in the GSL Stage, setting up Mate y Tapa as a strong contender heading into the weekend. Mate y Tapa survived a strong challenge from Triple pop (bibbaba/motion/osaft) in the upper bracket to advance to Championship Sunday with their spot in the semifinals all but secured.
As Mate y Tapa advanced, other top teams crumbled around them. No Balls Just Chase (cocoo/prozy/Shark.), a roster with a single RLCS EU main event appearance between them, made it through to the upper bracket thanks to a favorable group in the GSL Stage before taking Kaydop Corp to Game 7 overtime heading into the extended break before the final day of the season. They would keep up the momentum against Magnolia, upsetting the contenders 4-2, before finally seeing their run come to an end at the hands of Mate y Tapa.
On the other side of the playoff bracket, Volare (Crispy/Growlii/Tox) continued their last-life heroics after dropping to the lower bracket in the first series of their tournament by taking down Triple pop 4-3 in the quarterfinals. Their next series against Kaydop Corp would prove to be tournament defining: against the would-be favorites, Volare’s chaotic style of Rocket League flustered the more experienced side, eventually sending them home by virtue of a 4-2 scoreline. With the three favorites all eliminated before the grand finals, the stage was set for an underdog — either Mate y Tapa or Volare — to claim Europe’s sixth and final RLCS Worlds spot.
Continuing in tradition with Volare’s other series to that point, the grand finals was a messy, no-holds-barred affair that required every last bit of strength out of the players to push to the finish line. Mate y Tapa sailed to a 2-0 lead before Volare’s last-minute antics and goal-line defense leveled the series at two apiece. Mate y Tapa got to match point first in a dominant Game 5 (where they outshot Volare 16-1, though only won 1-0), but Volare struck back, with Tox cleaning up a broken play high in the Mate y Tapa box in overtime to send the series to Champions Field. Much of the series to that point had been defined by exceptional individual performances by AtomiK and Joseph "Growlii" Caffrey, with each pulling through in the clutch on both ends of the pitch at different times throughout the series.
With the stakes as high as they could get, Game 7 was played as a nervous — but loose — contest, with Mate y Tapa holding the majority of the pressure on Volare (as they had all series) but finding themselves unable to break through. Dorito finally broke the deadlock with 1:43 remaining on the clock before being countered by a phenomenal redirect double tap by Shaun "Crispy" Tafara Murindagomo to level the game. A quick kickoff goal would spell disaster for Volare and secure victory for Mate y Tapa, though, as AtomiK’s strike would win the series for his team and send them to Fort Worth.
Mate y Tapa’s last-minute victory, broke RLCS LAN droughts for Dorito (who hadn’t qualified since the 2024 Copenhagen Major) and ajg (2022-23 World Championship) while also giving the two and AtomiK their first LAN appearances of RLCS 2026. ajg’s qualification also breaks a drought of Argentinian players not qualifying for a World Championship dating back to his appearance in Düsseldorf in 2023.
Volare’s loss spelled yet more heartbreak for Tox, who found himself just one spot away from an RLCS LAN for the eighth time in his career. Growlii and Crispy, both veterans of the RLCS in their own right, were also denied a chance to qualify for their first RLCS LAN (excluding Crispy’s qualification to the offline portion of NA Open 1 at the RLCS 2026 Kickoff LAN).
Mate y Tapa will likely stand as the weakest major-region side at the World Championship, and will be underdogs to Virtus.pro in their second Play-In match if they defeat Five Fears. Their path after a potential loss to the North Americans wouldn’t get any easier, with a likely date with FUT Esports or Team Falcons awaiting them in the lower bracket. Regardless, as Ninjas in Pyjamas showed the Rocket League world in Lyon, the EU LCQ winners should be underestimated at their own peril. For ajg, AtomiK, and Dorito — three players with 12 RLCS LAN appearances between them — they, like NIP, will enter Fort Worth with everything to play for and nothing to lose.
