The Most Successful Brazilian CS:GO Roster Part Ways with Fnx
The most successful roster in Brazilian Counter-Strike: Global Offensive history is parting ways with one of its signature players.
After a year with the team, Lincoln “fnx” Lau will no longer represent SK Gaming, according to a report by Slingshot earlier this week. This means the roster that won both Valve majors in 2016 is no more.
Despite consistently performing well in the past few months, the celebrated Brazilian squad has been struggling to secure victories. It appears that SK Gaming’s disappointing semi-final performance in the second season of ELEAGUE was the final straw.
The roster change came just four days before the LAN finals of the Esports Championship Series second season. SK Gaming will be using former G2 Esports AWPer Ricardo “fox” Pacheco in place of fnx.
Rumors of fnx’s departure started circulating in November, when several competitive CS:GO teams in Brazil were making significant roster changes.
In interviews, SK Gaming’s in-game leader, Gabriel “FalleN” Toledo, was open about the situation, mentioning internal issues and a lack of focus within the roster. At the time, the team decided not to make any roster moves and continued to consistently place within the top four of various tournaments.
In the organization’s official press release, FalleN provided an explanation for the move. “Our team can only be successful when all players are constantly working towards the same goal,” he said. “Recently, it didn’t feel like everybody shared the same vision for our team’s future.”
FalleN emphasized, however, that the decision was not due to any lack of commitment from fnx. He mentioned that the player had been trying extremely hard in the last months to fix the situation, but ultimately, they felt a change was necessary for the team’s development.