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GUIDES
Simple Radar
© 2026 TLDR Media, All Rights Reserved.
Not caring about your reputation is certainly a bold move.
If you’re going to write reports about the CS scene, you probably shouldn’t start releasing fake ones. KRL learned that the hard way this week.
Also this week: Monte have returned with one of the international teams of all time, and the Thunderpick World Championships got underway over in Malta.
Ah, an AI slop announcement. Must be a new Monte roster.
Real question, though: would it actually set you back that much to pay an editor to cook up something decent? Sorry, sensitive topic.
That’s right, the Ukrainian org is back and ready to “conquer new heights” with the middest roster you’ve ever seen - Astralis excluded, obviously. Captain sdy and coach T.c lead the charge, with mantuu, br0, St0m4k and CYPHER filling out the ranks.
Yes, the same CYPHER who was on Into the Breach while its CEO sucked it dry, and on BLEED while it was hemorrhaging money everywhere but into the players’ pockets. So, naturally, where does he go next? Monte. The guy must be allergic to getting paid on time.
Oh, you haven’t heard? Silly us, we forget most people aren’t chronically online and actually have these things called ‘jobs’. Ew.
Basically, Monte’s rebuild comes less than two months after a messy public fallout with its previous lineup. When Bymas, afro, AZUWU, and Rainwaker left for Luminosity over the summer, Monte released a video where CEO Dmytro Vovk accused them of hiding the move during extension talks.
According to the players, though, Monte is yet another prestigious member of the “we’ll pay you soon(ish)” club, owing them tens of thousands of dollars in salary, prize money, and sticker revenue. The org denied it, then admitted it, then pulled the classic “it’s not our fault” card, blaming delayed transfer and sponsorship payments.
It’s basically esports’ version of the ‘chicken or the egg’ conundrum, and it happens a lot more often than you’d think.
That said, we can only hope Monte has learned from its mistakes and can properly support this new squad and its ambitions. Which, let’s be honest, shouldn’t be much more than winning some random Tier 3 LAN in the middle of nowhere.
Let’s just hope they see their respective share of that prize money when the time comes…
Everyone loves opening cases, so Valve had to ruin them by making them those miserable terminals. Of course, you could still buy old cases and open those at extortionate prices, but why line the pockets of Valve if they can’t be f-cked to even make a working anti-cheat?
Fortunately, our friends at Razed have the solution for this, so get yourselves on razed.io by using our referral link and get three free cases upon sign-up!
This week on Overtime on Inferno we have a very special guest, as Thorin joins Sam to chat about the most headache inducing news in Counter-Strike.
Sadly it turns out Spirit were a placeholder number one team, and French “insider” KRL has tarnished his rep with an intentionally fake m0NESY leak…
Welcome to sunny Malta, a place with a very rich history in CS. By rich, we of course mean in terms of money, and as is often the case round these parts, a huge stack of it is up for grabs this weekend courtesy of Thunderpick.
Eight teams have shown up to do battle, with many of the top teams choosing to skip the event, opening up a chance for the underdogs to take important wins.
Action kicked off on Wednesday with precisely such a match, as 9z took down Aurora in a surprise 2-0 victory. It’s a strong win for 9z, but we’re inclined to say it’s yet another aberration from Aurora. It’s very difficult to know just how good that team is right now.
Falcons took down NIP, who took on the daring task of attending two LAN events in the same week, in two different cities four hours away. After having lost to Aurora, we honestly think they’re relieved they didn’t survive to day three.
9z showed some sign of life in the winner’s game against Falcons, but a 2-1 for the latter side sets them up as group winners.
Over in group B, Brazil conquered Russia in both opening series as Legacy, once again with arT, and FURIA prevailed over BETBOOM and PARIVISION. A three-map affair in the elimination game crowned BETBOOM as the stronger of the two, sending PARIVISION home with yet another disappointing group stage exit.
The Brazilian derby became a late affair as the two teams traded each other’s map picks to set up a deciding Mirage game for the group win. A more or less painless affair for FURIA to book their spot straight into the semifinal - crucially avoiding Falcons in the first round.
With Falcons and FURIA locked in for playoffs, this sets up a deciding rematch between Aurora and 9z, while Legacy will take on BETBOOM for the final spot in the semifinals. Realistically, we should see two Brazilian teams in the playoffs, but we’ve seen enough of this team to know you can’t ever count out Boombl4.
Is any of this interesting for the Major race, or a prestigious trophy? Absolutely f-cking not, but it’s CS, init?
Everything felt normal on Monday night. Vitality had just won another trophy, MOUZ had just sh-t the bed in another final, and I was experiencing yet another travel delay in a year where I can never travel on time.
And then KRL posted a tweet that sent the entire CS community into a spin.
The tweet stated that a “tier 1” organisation were pushing to sign m0NESY, and that “talks with Falcons were advanced”.
Of course, everyone presumed this meant that m0NESY would soon be turning out for Spirit, and when his brother started baiting on Telegram, and msdossary posted an apology on Twitter, it actually seemed like it might be real.
Right up until the point that Falcons posted a video to say that m0NESY has extended his contract until 2030.
The aftermath, as you might expect, was not favourable towards KRL.
Previously the most reputable of leakers, or insiders, or whatever the f-ck we’re supposed to call them that isn’t “journalist”, KRL was now seen as a pariah. Someone who was willing to tank his entire reputation on a tweet he was paid to post by a not-well-liked org, or worse - not even receive payment at all.
It’s just another lesson for these types of people that if you act like a journalist, no matter what you define yourself as, you will always be a journalist.
Now that it’s been a few days, the heat has faded from KRL, and sadly, the community will likely forget that this ever happened when he gets a correct report or two after Singapore.
But.
If KRL’s next report turns out to be a swing and a miss, well, let’s just say he won’t be posting anything about CS for a while.
So, kids, if you ever want to get into writing about CS, let this be a lesson to you:
If you present yourself as an individual to be taken seriously, you must therefore actually act like a person who is to be taken seriously, otherwise you end up looking like a f-cking idiot.
