Navi
In December 2009, eSports was still gaining momentum, but the number of professional tournaments held was constantly growing. Just at this time, the Kazakh philanthropist Murat “Arbalet” Zhumashevich decided to create several organizations in which he was going to act as the main sponsor. The main goal set for the new teams was to bring together the best players in their countries and make them true professionals.
As a result, Navi has become one of the largest esports teams, successfully performing in various disciplines for many years. During this time, the organization managed to become a real symbol of the CIS and acquired a huge fan base. True, in the era of CS:GO, the tag was relatively unlucky, because all the rosters consistently reached the finals of major tournaments, but could not win the main trophies. Moreover, the change of composition did not always give positive results. But significant changes occurred with the arrival of a new player – Alexander s1mple Kostylev. This is one of the strongest players in the world, and he does not get tired of proving it.
Due to his phenomenal play, he managed to become top 1 in the world rankings in 2018 and take second places in 2019 and 2020. This allows us to consider him not only the strongest, but also the most stable.
It is important to note that the organization keeps the same composition for a long time and maintains iron discipline in it. Together with stable sponsorship, this gives serious hopes that sooner or later the team will be able to achieve the desired result and become the leader of the international CS:GO scene.
Natus Vincere first roster
None of what we know now would have happened without that very first roster that managed to loudly declare itself in CS 1.6 and win a lot of trophies. In addition to the players Edward, markeloff, starix, ceh9 and zeus, the manager of the ZeroGravity roster, who later led the organization for a long time, played a big role in the success.
“Edward” John Sukharev
“Markeloff” Egor Markelov
«Starix» Sergey Ischuk
“Ceh9” Arseniy Trynozhenko
“Zeus” Daniil Teslenko
During 2010, 12 awards were won at various tournaments, 8 of them turned out to be gold. At that time, it was the best result and the most successful year for a single team in history.
Recall that now Navi is an esports organization with its own rosters in several disciplines. In particular, the Dota 2 team won the first ever world championship in 2011, earning $1 million. In addition, LoL, Apex teams and so on perform on an ongoing basis.
In addition to everything, fan bars are now functioning. For example, they can be found in Kyiv. There you can plunge into the atmosphere of the game, watching the matches of your favorite team, ordering food and drinks from a wide menu. There, everyone can buy fan merchandise with autographs of their idols, try branded cocktails and much more.
Gambit
The CS roster was formed in 2015, and the management and coaching staff included people who once belonged to the M19 and VP teams.
“Dosia” Mikhail Stolyarov
«AdreN» Dauren Kystaubaev
“hooch” Dmitry Bogdanov
“wayLander” Jan Rahkonen
“mou” Rustem Telepov
The team progressed quite quickly. In 2016, the team was able to qualify for the major, and the very next year it managed to enter the top eight. In the same year, the composition underwent significant changes. Daniil “zeus” Teslenko and Abai “HObbit” Khasenov were added to Adren, mou and Dosia. With this line-up, they managed to consistently win two minor tournaments, and then get the status of legends in the major.
The most successful year in the history of the squad was 2017. At many tournaments at once, they managed to show their best side, which is only worth the second place at cs_summit and the championship at DH Austin, and even once again confirm the status of legends.
The real success came in July 2017. By winning the PGL in Krakow, becoming the first team from the CIS to win gold awards at the most prestigious CS:GO tournament. In the same year, Gambit was still waiting for the third place in the DH Masters and the victory at the ROG Masters. At the same time, several players entered the top twenty in 2017.
Gambit won Major
Let’s take a closer look at what allowed our team to climb to the top of the podium. For starters, let’s take a look at the PGL Major Krakow playoff bracket.
The first match against Fnatic was very difficult, but ended up 2-0, although there were many moments during each map when everything should have ended in favor of the Swedes.
After that, there was a match against then formidable Danes from Astralis. During all the maps, the game was played on an equal footing, but aggressive actions allowed the guys from the CIS to pull out Train with a score of 16:12, and then it was already a matter of technique.
In the long-awaited final, the Gambits were expected by the Brazilian team Immortals. The confrontation took place on the maps Cobblestone, Train and Inferno. The first map without a chance ended with a score of 4:16 in favor of the Brazilians. But already on the next map, the initiative went over to the side and finished it 16:11. The last card of the confrontation was played by both sides with great care, but in the end, Gambit celebrated the victory.
The prize for first place in the tournament was a solid $500,000. Of course, we can say that the victory was the result of luck, but only the strongest are lucky and it is simply impossible to win in so many matches without skill.
