We’ve had an intense first week after TI 9 with many major player moves taking place. As it turns out, the second week has been just as crazy as the first. The scary part is, that according to the official information we now have, the 2019-2020 DPC season is due to start in early November – meaning we still have plenty of time left for changes.
Let’s take a look at the most interesting shuffles:
Ohaiyo is LFT
The first big news of the week happened on Tuesday when Khoo “Ohaiyo” Chong Xin announced that he is now looking for a new team. We can surely say that this was expected, as Ohaiyo did not have the best season with his team WarriorsGaming.Unity.
In fact, ever since he left Fnatic, things are just going downhill. Fortunately, there are many “free agents” right now so it is very likely to see him in a new formation soon. After all, a player of his caliber is more than capable of playing in pretty much any top team right now.
Topson to take some time off
Topias Miikka “Topson” Taavitsainen is definitely the player to “blame” for OG’s success during this years’ TI. He was having the time of his life, especially during the Grand Final vs Team Liquid. According to him, he will be taking some time off to spend with his family. We don’t know exactly when he’s going to be back but it will most likely be after the start of the new DPC season.
There is a big question mark over OG’s current roster for the upcoming season. According to rumours, ana is also going to be taking some time off – similar to last year. If this true, OG will only have three active players.
Fnatic has a new roster
If we have to summarize Fnatic’s performance at TI 9 with one word, it has to be ‘disappointing’. The SEA powerhouse was considered to be one of the heavy favorites to win the entire event. However, they completely crumbled during the Group Stage – which pushed them into the Lower Bracket. As if that was not enough, they had to face none other than Team Liquid, who turned out to be one of the strongest teams at the tournament.
Their poor results were a wake-up call that something had to be changed. That’s why the team has added two new players – 23savage and moon. Unfortunately, one of the best players in the world Abed Azel L. Yusop was one of those who left, which means that he’s currently a free agent.
On paper, Fnatic looks rock-solid. That said, we are yet to see what will happen once the new season starts.
Mushi joins Keen Gaming
Keen Gaming had a very solid run throughout the DPC season. This gave them a fairly early direct invite, which unfortunately seemed to negatively impact the team as a whole. In fact, they started to perform worse and worse with each tournament – to the point where they failed to even qualify for the last couple of big events.
That’s why expectations were so low for Keen in TI 9, and after a pretty mediocre Group Stage, they were eliminated in R1 of the Lower Bracket by Infamous.
Chai “Mushi” Yee Fung, on the other hand, took the coaching role for Mineski before TI. He probably did a good job considering their performance, but despite that, Mineski ended up disbanding. That’s why Mushi has joined forces with Keen Gaming for the new DPC season. Hopefully, both parties will benefit well from the move next season.
9pasha & ArsZeeqq leave VP
Without a doubt the biggest change that took place this week. Virtus.Pro, one of the best teams in the world, was looking very dominant prior to TI 9. In fact, similar to last year, they were the first team to secure their direct invite after winning the first big tournaments. Unfortunately, it seems there is some sort of “bad juju” at TI as they always seem to underperform at the event. This year was no exception.
Unfortunately, changes had to be made in order to try and break the curse. That’s why Pavel “9pasha” Khvastuno and Arsenij “ArsZeeqq“ Usov are now officially no longer a part of VP. 9pasha will play under Na’Vi’s banner for the new DPC season, taking the place of Evgeniy ‘Blizzy’ Ree.
Virtus.Pro has not yet announced who will be taking the offlane role after Pavel left. There are many rumors, with some indicating that VP could potentially be entirely re-build. However, until they are confirmed, nothing is certain.
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