Ukrainian AWPer Yegor “markeloff” Markelov, one of the most dominant players back in the Counter-Strike: 1.6 days, has been on the sidelines since 2018 and made just a few public appearances. This could change in the near future, though, since markeloff seems to be working on something new, according to his former Natus Vincere teammate Ioann “Edward” Sukhariev.
One fan asked Edward in one of his latest Twitch streams if he has kept in touch with markeloff and Edward teased that one of the greatest CS: 1.6 players of all time might be up for a comeback.
“It seems you will all see him soon,” Edward said, according to a translation made by the website Escore News. “There’s something interesting coming with markeloff, some news.”
Markeloff made the switch to CS:GO in 2012, the year the game came out, but he never really found his footing in the new game. The veteran played for NAVI, Astana Dragons, and HellRaisers, and spent the last three years of his career on Flipsid3 Tactics until he retired in 2018. He attended several CS:GO Majors and won one relevant tournament—the $100,000 DreamHack Open Leipzig in January 2017—while he was still active.
It’s unlikely that markeloff will try to be a professional player again due to his advanced age for esports (35 years old), but he could become a coach or start a living as a content creator, based on what Edward said.
This comes at a moment when Counter-Strike 2 is reportedly coming out at the end of March, which could attract a lot of veterans like markeloff to play the game again. Markeloff was a part of the NAVI CS: 1.6 lineup between 2010 and 2012 that won nearly all of the important events such as World Cyber Games 2010, DreamHack Winter 2010, and IEM V in 2011.
