DreamHack Open Leipzig will kick off on Jan. 24 and run until Jan. 26. The $100,000 CSGO event in Leipzig, Germany is packed with teams that have acquired entirely new rosters or have made some roster alterations in recent times. The eight teams are split into Group A and Group B, with a Group play before the two best teams from each group move into the Play-offs.
With the start of this event fast-approaching, let’s take a look at each of the participating teams. We’ll start here with the four teams of Group A: Cloud9, BIG, Renegades, and Virtus.pro.
Cloud9
Cloud9 has recently acquired the ATK CSGO roster. Consisting of an American-South African medley, the quintet impressed under their former banner, especially at ESL Pro League finals and some late-2019 ECS events. Meanwhile, Cloud9 had an extremely rough 2019 season, with multiple roster changes that yielded little to no improvement. The former ATK roster was impressive, but can they live up to the expectations of Cloud9’s glory from 2018 and before? This event will be their first exam.
BIG
BIG Clan had a turbulent end to 2019. After re-signing Owen “smooya” Butterfield to the roster, it seemed like things would go back to normal. Unfortunately, they didn’t. The team didn’t mold together again as well as most thought they would. Therefore, more changes came around.
The German organization decided to form an almost-fully German roster, dropping smooya once again and acquiring a former duo from Sprout, Nils “k1to” Gruhne and Florian “syrsoN” Rische. The only non-German on the roster is Ismailcan “XANTARES” Dörtkardeş. While known to be one of the most talented fraggers on the scene, he has not yet impressed under the BIG banner. Perhaps with the refreshed lineup, the Turk will show some more edge in the 2020 CSGO season – especially while his team is on home soil at DreamHack Open Leipzig.
Renegades
Renegades are yet another CSGO team that had quite the roster shuffle. The team lost its talent-filled lineup when it was acquired by the newly formed 100 Thieves. After a brief hiatus, Renegades came back to the scene with, in turn, Grayhound Gaming’s lineup. But the roster changes did not stop there. Recently, Renegades decided to drop one of the most iconic players from their lineup, Ollie “DickStacy” Tierney. To fill the vacancy, the team picked up a former Australian player from ORDER, Jordan “Hatz” Bajic.
This will also be Renegades’ first true test in 2020. After losing a very strong core of five players, can the new quintet come up big for the organization?
Virtus.pro
Virtus.pro, a team that used to be considered a true Polish CSGO powerhouse, is no longer Polish at all. Despite being a Russian-owned organization, Virtus.pro used to be filled with only Polish players, and it was a dominant force on the scene. This has changed drastically, however, following internal problems between the players and the organization that led to the players going their separate ways. Since then, Virtus.pro has failed to find the appropriate players to bring the team back to their once-winning ways.
Well, the management up top finally decided it was time to try something new. Polish Virtus.pro is no more, as the whole AVANGAR roster now represents their banner. After an impressive run in 2019 where they saw the final of the StarLadder Major in Berlin and success at BLAST Pro Series Moscow, it’s no wonder that Virtus.pro’s management chose to pick up this roster.
Make sure to check out Group B’s preview as well.
What do you think of the Group A team lineups at DreamHack Open Leipzig? As always, remember to follow us at Daily Esports for all your latest news in CSGO as well as other major esports out there.
Published: Jan 24, 2020 12:19 am