Team Liquid is benching Aleks “Rainwaker” Petrov after mere months with a European majority roster, according to a report from Ryan Friend of Dust2.us. They will play with their coach, Damian “daps” Steele, at the upcoming BLAST Fall Showdown, the report states. While Rainwaker isn’t completely cut from the organization, he will not play in the upcoming event. Liquid are currently juggling roles between players, and there’s a chance Rainwaker could return to the starting roster in the future.
For years, Team Liquid was the face and hope of North American Counter-Strike. Their move away from two legendary players, Jonathan “EliGE” Jablonowski and Nick “nitr0” Cannella, transitioning to a European-majority roster, earned the ire of many NA fans. The new roster vastly underperformed since then, bombing out of ESL Pro League Season 18, Gamers8, and the IEM Cologne play-in.
If Liquid does decide to ultimately move on from Rainwaker, the choices out there are slim. The North American CS scene was devastated by tournament organizers and organizations moving away from the region, as well as the release of VALORANT pulling in players who were looking for a fatter paycheck. The result was a region with virtually nothing to grind for, and no infrastructure to develop younger players in a way that would ensure a seamless transitions into tier one competitions. Many teams have already moved to Europe to practice, as Liquid already has.
With no clear path ahead, and Liquid’s young European talent not performing as expected, it will be a tall task to get this team up to speed. They’ll soon be passed by NA-majority Complexity in the HLTV world rankings if they aren’t careful, and they risk stagnating in results in a period when they’ve alienated their normally stalwart fanbase.
The clock is ticking: the BLAST Fall Showdown commences in mere days, on Oct. 4.
