Rollin’ back the years

The good ol’ days are back.

With all the talk of the AWP being nerfed, being bad, and being too slow on CS2, it’s down to the boomers to teach these new dogs some old tricks - which is why both FalleN and JW won their LANs this weekend.

Admittedly, FalleN has been taken off IGLing duties and JW was only AWPing against Swedish teams, but it’s a start. FURIA were playing at Elisa Masters Espoo, an event in Finland with some solid teams, while JW’s EYEBALLERS won a Swedish event known as Svenska Cupen, for reference.

FURIA switched back to arT’s rather roguish and unique style of calling for an event and the results were incredible - exactly as good as they used to be. They rolled over MOUZ, HAVU and Apeks en route to their biggest ever LAN victory.

Yep, really. KSCERATO has been a world class rifler for this long and has never won anything better than Elisa Masters Espoo. Not that the event is bad, it’s just… it feels like KSCERATO should win events like this for breakfast.

It was neither FalleN nor KSCERATO who took MVP, though. Nor was it yuurih, or arT, or even chelo (who was their highest rated player in a 3-1 grand final win over Apeks). It was nawwk, who was the only shining light on Apeks in the final, and a large reason they got to it in the first place.

Now, what sort of team could do with a Swedish AWPer who averages 1.28 ratings at a tier two event? Beats us, honestly.

On an unrelated note, Ninjas in Pyjamas went out in the semi-finals of Svenska Cupen to GODSENT, with - and we’re not messing with you here - Plopski topfragging.

If there is a god, he’s not an NIP fan, and he’s got a great sense of humour.

We should say they were playing with Silence and maxster instead of headtr1ck and alex, but that’s “context” and “facts” that get in the way of an amusing story.

GODSENT went on to get absolutely smacked by a vintage JW performance, which is glorious. We’d forgotten he was still playing, frankly, but seeing him shine once again made us feel all warm and gooey inside.

The Cold Brothers reunite

Winter is coming.

Well, winter has very much already hit. We’re not sure if you’ve left the house in the last week, but we don’t recommend it. It’s baltic out there.

It’s getting even colder over at FaZe, though. Reports suggest the replacement for the outgoing (already gone) Twistzz might just be frozen - who has been one of the best players in the world for the last 12 months.

This is a roomshaker, a landscape-changer, a thigh-rubber of a move. This one is exciting, not least because it initiates the reunion of the Cold Brothers (Robin) Kool and frozen.

Replacing Twistzz is one of the hardest things to do in the whole world of Counter-Strike, but if you have to, signing a genuine top five rifler isn’t a bad way to go about it.

frozen is ridiculously good, and while he’s largely taken roles akin to those that ropz took (notice how his rating rose after ropz left MOUZ), he’s versatile enough to play basically any role well. He didn’t come in to MOUZ as a ready-made superstar - he’s done his time.

If there’s any IGL who can get the best out of multiple superstar riflers at once, also, it’s karrigan.

Not only does this consolidate and solidify FaZe’s spot at the top - at least in theory - this directly weakens one of the few teams who could challenge their throne.

Especially when you see who they’re picking up to replace him (temporarily, at least)…

Quick fix for a not so MOUZ size problem

So, you’re MOUZ and you have just days to replace your best player, what do you do?

MOUZ made the sensible first step of going for a stand-in even the best scout would have a hard time to identify and sign a new star in a few days. But we’re not quite sure we agree on their final decision, Brollan, the ever-so-mediocre Swedish rifler.

Brollan’s failed to impress for a while now, resulting in NIP benching him back in October. His LAN rating for the year is a textbook mid: 1.00 across 88 maps. Not to mention, he got those numbers playing almost the same roles as xertioN. Who by the way is averaging a 1.10.

So why pick him?

Well, the BLAST World Finals registry deadline is looming and given that pressure, you can certainly do worse than Brollan. But, surely if you’re a MOUZ NXT player you’re miffed.

MOUZ has a phenomenal track record of scouting and developing future FaZe players young talent, so wouldn’t it make more sense to field one of those? BLAST seems like a good opportunity to give a future star some top LAN experience with the low expectations of being a stand-in.

NXT or not, siuhy now has the unenviable task of fitting Brollan into this MOUZ team in short order. But hey, it’s just for one event, right?

MOUZ at BLAST World Finals are:

👺 Wanna see my evil side?

😬 Yikes HooXi

🚗🔥 Going back in time at a steady 88 MPH

This TL;DR was written by aizyesque, NER0, Horizzon and napz.
Crash_ coded the email and copy edited.

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