Cloud9 signs ATK roster ahead of DreamHack Leipzig, WINNERS League
Nick J. January 6, 2020
Cloud9 officially announced the signing of ATK's CSGO roster in a post on the organization's website.
The ATK roster joins Cloud9 after an impressive showing at the ESL Pro League Season 10 Finals where the team defeated both North and G2 Esports in best-of-threes before falling to eventual tournament winner mousesports in the third round of the lower bracket.
The full ATK roster has made the switch, including head coach Tiaan "T.c" Coertzen. Cloud9's roster is now comprised of five new players:
ATK's switch to Cloud9 confirms previous reports that connected Cloud9 to the ATK roster. As early as November, CSGO newcomer Gen.G began pursuing Cloud9 players Timothy "autimatic" Ta and Damien "daps" Steele. A connection between ATK and Cloud9 was reported on November 11.
After C9 trialed Yassine "Subroza"' Taoufik during BLAST Pro Series Copenhagen, the stand-in took to Twitter saying that "the team was already dead" by the time he joined. In response, C9 owner Jack Etienne defended the organization in a Reddit post, sharing previously unknown details about the move.
"The Cloud9 staff did an incredible job supporting the team and shouldn’t be taking any negative criticism. Once autimatic, Koosta and daps were traded to GenG, at their request, they made a decision to not practice," said Etienne.
Eventually, it turned out that Cloud9 had also sent Kenneth "koosta" Suen alongside autimatic and daps to Gen.G's first competitive Counter-Strike roster. autimatic was the last remaining player from the Cloud9 roster that made history by becoming the first North American team to win a CSGO major.
C9 expected at WINNERS League, DreamHack Leipzig
Earlier last week, C9 officially moved Oscar "mixwell" Cañellas to its bench and announced that Tyson "TenZ" Ngo would move to a streaming role for the organization. mixwell also announced that he is allowed to field offers from other teams.
Cloud9 has kept quiet about its CSGO roster over the past few months. After its experimental international squad featuring Robin "flusha" Rönnquist flopped, many wondered if Cloud9 was down for good in CSGO.
For Cloud9 fans, it feels like an eternity since C9 won the ELEAGUE Boston Major. But with C9's new team beating the projected odds against real opposition over the past six months, they might have a reason to be excited again.
