OG has confirmed that Topson is back in Europe after spending time away from the team during the transition to an online-only competitive Dota 2 scene.
The team has yet to announce its final two players for ESL One Birmingham Online, with only SumaiL, n0tail, and Saksa listed as ready for action.
This is likely just the team taking its time to decide which players it wants to utilize for the event, making sure Topson arrived with no complications and then looking at its remaining options. N0tail has the option to pull Ceb back in at position three for another event, or try once more to play around MidOne’s high ping if Topson is ready to jump back into action.
It is not likely that we will see OG pull up a player from OG Seed either. N0tail has shown he would rather let the developmental roster play together rather than use someone like Madara as a stand-in for too long.
At this point, it looks like Topson and Ceb will be the final players announced for the ESL One roster, since that would give them the benefit of four players competing from one region again, leaving only SumaiL as the outsider playing from North America. Not only would this improve their overall play based on connection, but Topson’s return should swing a lot of matches in OG’s favor.
There is still some time for OG to decide on a lineup—the team won’t be playing until 9am CT on May 25—but all signs are pointing to Topson making his return.