G2 Esports show signs of weakness after signing nexa

7 Dec

Radu Muresan

G2 Esports started this season with high hopes, not only because they had a formidable roster but also because they had confirmed their strength at BLAST Premier: World Final 2022, where they won the title.

Less than two months later, they also won the first big tournament of 2023, IEM Katowice. Throughout the year, they had just one more world-class performance, at IEM Cologne, where they won again. Among the less successful attempts to win a trophy in 2023, these are G2’s most significant:

9th – 12th place at ESL Pro League S17
5th – 8th place at ESL Pro League S18
7th – 9th place at BLAST Premier Fall Groups
5th – 6th place at IEM Dallas
12th – 14th place at BLAST.tv Paris Major

On November 21, out of the blue, G2 announced that Justin “jks” had been benched and that his place would be taken by Nemanja “nexa” Isakovic. Not long after this announcement was made, the team’s coach, Jan “Swani” Muller, announced that he would leave the team at the end of the season.

What seemed to be a perfectly stable roster is starting to change again. And some are starting to doubt those changes because they seem to be leading G2 in the wrong direction. For the club’s sake, let’s hope that what we saw at CCT Online Finals #5 was just a fluke.

HERE WE GO AGAIN pic.twitter.com/Qvik6ZIH2A

— G2 CS (@G2CSGO) December 6, 2023

The G2 Esports - CCT #5 Disaster

G2 Esports entered CCT Online Finals #5 expecting to either win the tournament or place 2nd. Their only real opponent should have been BIG. Apart from the German squad, there was nobody in the race that could defeat G2, at least on paper.

But after the first match, it was clear that something was wrong with them. They won, but not before losing a map against Fluxo.

In the second match of the tournament, G2 played against another team whose global rank is relatively low and won again with the same score. Sprout managed to beat G2 on their map pick, Mirage, and they did it convincingly: 3 – 13. Then, on the next two maps, they forced an overtime session.

G2 eventually won 16 – 13 on Overpass and 16 – 14 on Anubis, but the result itself was almost as bad as a failure. With such a performance, it was obvious at that point that a strong team would completely dismantle them in their current state.

What happened in the next two matches clearly demonstrated that the new iteration of G2 is a shadow of the previous one. Aurora Gaming defeated them with ease: 6 – 13 on Ancient and 2 – 13 on Nuke.

Then, in the lower bracket, they had to play a supposedly easy match against Guild Eagles. But they ended up losing again.

Was this failure a fluke? Or are we witnessing the beginning of a rough period in G2’s history? With less than a week until BLAST Premier: World Final 2023, their CS2 roster has very little time to prepare for opponents that are much stronger than the ones they faced in CCT Online Finals #5.

Header: G2 Esports

Zews returns as Head Coach for Team Liquid