IEM Beijing is well underway and unlike everyone else in the world - we’ve actually been watching it. Yes, we do understand that makes us degenerates, shut up.

Because we’ve been watching it, though, we’ve got some thoughts, and Falcons and Legacy are both in our crosshires today.

PARI...

2·1

G2

Aurora

2·1

G2

NAVI

2·1

Falcons

MongolZ

2·1

FURIA

Aurora

0·2

BetBoom

Aurora

0·2

Liquid

• bLitz, maaRaa, Team Liquid… we’re sorry, we should’ve just trusted you that you were back.
• G2, however, dios mio…

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Calling the year so early they think they’re playing VALORANT

At one point this year, Legacy has consolidated their place as the second Brazilian force after FURIA. They still are, but is it because they're good, or because the other options are just really f-cking bad?

Right now, they're ranked 13 in VRS, and won two trophies in 2026, but that doesn’t tell the full story of their year.

They were eliminated with just one win at the Cologne Major - without their coach behind because he violated communication rules. Then n1ssim was out, back again within a month, and now he’s out out again; and between that Brazilian rendition of the Hokey Cokey, arT got f-cking meningitis and was in hospital for EPL, meaning poor Legacy had to play with their assistant coach as a stand-in.

arT is back now, but either the illness or the fact that n1ssim wanted to be gone months ago has really hurt the team.

They’ve suffered three consecutive early exits after winning Fissure Playground 3, and now the question is unavoidable:

Is Legacy’s year just… over? It certainly looks that way.

Of course, there's this thing of them only lifting trophies in Asia and all the tournaments left are in Asia, but we’ll have to hold onto this superstition until next year, because Legacy aren’t winning sh-t right now.

ksloks is promising, even if his numbers on IEM Beijing didn't show that. The team needs time to adjust its new piece, and that takes time. So, whatever results they get the rest of the year, we’ll cut them some slack. They will do their best in Hong Kong and Singapore, and that may not be much (at least we don't expect it to be), but there’s too much talent on this team for them to not bounce back in 2027.

As they say: good things come to those who wait.

Skins = wins

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!

Mucking it up at the Major

The Major is fast approaching, and the likes of Spirit and Falcons could not be having a worse time in the build-up.

Nothing is sealed yet, but changes are more than possible if donk and friends flop in Singapore. Luckily for Spirit, our hosts AN1MO and quacke have already broke down who their best options for 2027 are.

• Spirit need two changes
• The IGL to replace FalleN
• Why it’s over for Falcons before the Major even starts goes here.

A b1t of a w0nderful time

It took a trip to the other side of the world, but NAVI have finally started living up to their name.

At IEM Beijing 2026, B1ad3’s boys finally did what their jerseys say they were born to do for the first time in a good while. The headlines will probably go to Falcons sh-tting the bed once again, but NAVI were the feel-good story of the group stage. They beat them twice en route to the Playoffs, thanks to disguntingly good performances from b1t and the second coming of prime s1mple. Welcome back lads.

MOUZ and The MongolZ were the other positives of the event so far. MOUZ’s undefeated run to the semis isn’t much of a surprise, given how tame Group B turned out to be. Same can’t be said for the Mongolians, who stormed through a stacked Group A with a FURIA-shaped cherry on top.

Now, Falcons… where do we even start?

Another early exit means there’s no denying that this season has been a disaster, and that Cologne is drifting dangerously close to fluke territory. At the eye of the storm is none other than karrigan, whose dogsh-t performances have somehow gotten even worse. Keep reading if you wanna find out what’s actually wrong with that lot.

Speaking of puppy poo, welcome to your biweekly dose of r1nkle hate.

G2 still haven’t managed to iron his ass out, and losses to PARIVISION and Aurora have only pushed them deeper into the mud. In case it wasn’t already obvious four months ago, it’s painfully clear now that he’s not Tier 1 material. If only G2 had one of the brightest AWP prospects in the world sitting on their bench…

Watching Legacy and 9z finally taught us what our moms have known for years every time they look at us: some things just never stop disappointing you. Not long ago, Legacy looked like they were onto something. Now, who the f-ck even knows what’s going on over there. As for 9z, they’ve hit rock bottom after an elimination loss to TYLOO made it seven straight. You know it’s dire when you can’t take a single map off TYLOO.

At least FaZe look like they’re on the right track… right?

All that money for five minutes of glory

Counter-Strike often parallels real life. After one hell of an evening, such as a Major final victory - or a crazy night out - it’s normal to need a day to properly recover from the hangover.

It’s also true that, as you get older, the hangover may last longer than just a day. Having said that, while we get that karrigan is about as old as they come… this is starting to get ridiculous.

It’s becoming more and more clear that Falcons have a problem, if not more than that. Another early elimination in Beijing - this time in the group stage - really underlined that this past week. With just a mere six weeks or so until the Singapore Major gets decided, something clearly needs to happen.

We think there are three problems with Falcons.

First of all - zonic. Oh, Danny, it just never ends, does it?

Look, we won’t harp on with all the same stuff that everyone else has said, but the more zonic opens his mouth, the more we’re starting to wonder how he’s got such a fat trophy cabinet. If only Falcons had a guy with a bird’s-eye view over the game, who could take a pause - a timeout, perhaps - to turn the team around after a bad start?

Thankfully, if Richard Lewis is to be believed, there is already a plan in place to solve this problem, as zonic will take a step back and be replaced by karrigan. This solution also solves our second problem with the team.

The old man doesn’t have it anymore.

There was a time when karrigan’s 0.90 rating was defensible, because the upside was some damn good calls. In 2026, his 0.75 rating is not, and given recent results, it seems even the upside is gone.

We’re not too surprised by this, to be fair. Looking back at karrigan’s career, a pattern emerges that suggests he, in some ways, is the Roberto Martinez of Counter-Strike. When your team is in trouble, he comes in and fixes it, but once you’re back on track, you can safely sack him, because it just doesn’t get better.

If all else fails, he’s got a spot at G2 if he wants to try his hand at fixing something unfixable.

But with those two problems out of the way, there’s just one left - and it’s not TeSeS. In fact, much like G2’s poor excuse for an AWPer, this one might genuinely be unfixable.

The million-dollar Russian kid.

The post-Major slump from kyousuke has been a growing problem for the team, tournament after tournament, and while our gut reaction to this quote from Mauisnake was that it was clever engagement bait, it’s starting to look more and more like the truth. The kid might just be unteachable, and if he doesn’t change that soon, this might be his individual peak.

“kyousuke probably truly cares about two things: money and Counter-Strike. He has already succeeded at both, so he most likely thinks he's on top of the world”, said Maui, implying he’s getting way too complacent.

And with rounds like this, we’re very much in agreement. The last person to play like that was Jordanian, and where is he now?

We can’t quite believe we’re saying this, but as long as the pickups are sensible, letting zonic, karrigan, and kyousuke all go this winter might end up being an upgrade for Falcons. When was the last time you could say something like that about a reigning Major champion?

📺 Look mom I’m on TV!

• Hey you. Yeah, you. Do you like Everything Else so much you’d wish there was a show based around it hosted by a marginally handsome, posh sounding, glorious mustache wearing Brit? Well, now there is. Enjoy.

🚢❄️ NNN? More like Edmund Fitzgerald month.

• The colder months are upon us, and even woxic has to layer up to be the whiplash-inducing AWPer that he normally is.
• SicK really seems to have taken his nickname literally ever since he retired.

🟦 The H in HLTV stands for Hiring and Hall of Fame

• Seems like everyone and their mums are getting a job at HLTV now. Congrats to Luz, big fans of your work you cheeky quant.
• It’s that time of year again where HLTV asks us all to induce a legend in the hall of fame. There’s too many to pick from and we hate disappointing people.