Back to the big time

Report: EG, OG, and NAVI rosters confirmed for BLAST

Three organizations without official announcements have submitted rosters.

The roster lock for the BLAST Premier Fall Groups commencing on Thursday afternoon forced a number of teams to rush through their potential player transfers earlier than anticipated. While the penalty for not submitting a roster on time might be considered an inconvenient seeding sanction, it was significant enough that teams were motivated to push through any lingering roster issues.

With Liquid and Complexity having finalized their moves at the dying hours before the lock, there are three teams that have yet to make official announcements of any rumored moves; Evil Geniuses, OG, and Natus Vincere. The North American organization is reported to have reverted from a European-core focused lineup to just using their Blueprint program and promoting several of their young players into the main roster.

For the European organizations of OG and Natus Vincere, both are undergoing significant rebuilds according to current rumors. OG have listed Adam "NEOFRAG" Zouhar and Abdulkhalik "degster" Gasanov for transfer, while allowing Nikolaj "niko" Kristensen and Shahar "flameZ" Shushan to move on from the organization after the expiration of their contracts. flameZ has since been signed by Vitality.

Under the rebuild, OG has apparently sought to bring in Dion "⁠FASHR⁠" Derksen, Nils "⁠k1to⁠" Gruhne, and Iulian "⁠regali⁠" Harjău, who will also be joined by returning IGL Nemanja "⁠nexa⁠" Isaković. Dust2.us can confirm that this roster has been submitted to BLAST for the upcoming Fall Group stage.

As for Natus Vincere, they are the most talked-about organization in recent weeks with their dramatic choice to move on from a CIS-focused squad and search for international talent. Mihai "⁠iM⁠" Ivan, and Ninjas in Pyjamas' benched in-game leader Aleksi "⁠Aleksib⁠" Virolainen, were the two high-profile targets of the organization, both seemingly confirmed as new additions to the squad following their roster submission earlier this week.

Additionally, Justinas "jL" Lekavicius also appears on the roster following his link to the Ukrainian organization. Denis "electroNic" Sharipov and Ilya "Perfecto" Zalutskiy, both linked to Russian side Cloud9, do not appear on the roster at all. However, Andrij "npl" Kukharsjkyj is listed on the roster, but is not expected to be a starting player.

Finally, Evil Geniuses have submitted a full roster for the BLAST Premier Fall Groups which primarily features members of the Evil Geniuses Black roster. Main roster members Vincent "Brehze" Cayonte, Sanzhar "neaLaN" Iskhakov, and Ismail "refrezh" Ali do not appear listed on the roster at this time.

In their place, Colby "Walco" Walsh, Jeorge "Jeorge" Endicott, Paytyn "junior" Johnson, Jadan "HexT" Postma, William "RUSH" Wierzba, Jerric "wiz" Jiang, and Timothy "autimatic" Ta have been listed as players with Tommy "Axed" Ryan as the coach. Initially Dust2.us had reported that Damien "maLeK" Marcel would be the coach of the roster. According to previous reports, the starting player lineup for Evil Geniuses at BLAST would be Walco, Jeorge, junior, HexT, and autimatic.

Below are the following rosters for the teams yet to make official announcements:

OG Roster

  • Maciej "F1KU" Miklas

  • Nemanja "⁠nexa⁠" Isaković

  • Iulian "⁠regali⁠" Harjău

  • Nils "⁠k1to⁠" Gruhne

  • Dion "⁠FASHR⁠" Derksen

  • Denmark Casper "ruggah" Due (Coach)

NAVI Roster

  • Oleksandr "s1mple" Kostyljev

  • Valerij "b1t" Vakhovsjkyj

  • Aleksi "Aleksib" Virolainen

  • Mihai "⁠iM⁠" Ivan

  • Justinas "jL" Lekavicius

  • Andrij "B1ad3" Ghorodensjkyj (Coach)

Evil Geniuses Roster

  • United States Timothy "autimatic" Ta

  • Canada Colby "Walco" Walsh

  • United States Jeorge "Jeorge" Endicott

  • United States Paytyn "junior" Johnson

  • Canada Jadan "HexT" Postma

  • United States William "RUSH" Wierzba

  • United States Jerric "wiz" Jiang

  • United States Tommy "Axed" Ryan (Coach)

Also read

#1(With 0 replies)
June 24, 2023 11:06AM
ThugsBunny268
I like that eg squad alot ngl
You must be logged in to add a comment.