ATK inks former EG White player

ATK have introduced their newest member of the squad, Jonathan "djay" Dallal as a replacement for Ian "motm" Hardy whose departure was announced announced just one week ago.

The departure of djay from EG White marked the end of a long-term partnership with Josh "PwnAlone" Pigue and Ben "ben1337" Smith that began in mid-2020 when ben1337 joined New England Whalers. Despite a slight interruption on High Coast, the trio were one of the most consistent cores of the COVID and post-COVID era, regularly competing at the top of the North American domestic scene.

djay was first signed by Evil Geniuses in early June and it was the first time the player had been a part of such a prestigious organization. Despite underwhelming international showings at the Pinnacle Cup Championship and ESL Challenger Melbourne 2022, the squad maintained their position as a top squad in North America, in part due to solid form from djay.

This decision by Evil Geniuses is potentially based around the prospect of bringing in younger players like Khizar "Momo" Rehman, whom the organization may believe have longer-term growth potential. Additionally, it seems to follow the trend of tinkering with their academy teams' cores, something that has also been seen with Carpe Diem/Evil Geniuses Black.

motm has been a widely known name in the American CS:GO scene, having been a player in squads like the 2019 variant of Party Astronauts, the South African/North American Cloud9, an early iteration of Extra Salt, and the all USA-born Triumph. Some stints were longer than others but none were as long as his time with ATK which started in August 2021 and ended in November 2022.

ATK announcing the signing of djay keeps the team with enough North American players to continue participating in the region for the RMR events, as the squad looks towards the upcoming BLAST.tv Paris Major cycle. ATK finished the last RMR with a 2-3 record, just outside of the qualification spots for IEM Rio.

The current ATK squad is:

• Michael "Swisher" Schmid

• Gareth "MisteM" Ries

• Rhys "Fadey" Armstrong

• Jonathan "b0denmaster" Bodenmalm

• Jonathan "djay" Dallal

• Daniel "sprayxd" Kogan (Coach)