After being benched from Cloud9, Ryan “freakazoid” Abadir will make a return to Counter-Strike next weekend—but only temporarily.
Freakazoid will play at DreamHack Austin as a stand-in player for MLG Columbus competitors Splyce. The team’s invitation to DreamHack Austin was announced only yesterday—too short notice for starter Abraham “abe” Fasli to change plans he’d made for a vacation.
Since freakazoid was removed from the Cloud9 starting lineup, his future has been the subject of much speculation. According to a report from Richard Lewis at Breitbart, Echo Fox were interested in the player as part of a major overhaul. The Rick Fox-owned side are led by freakazoid’s former teammate Sean Gares, and have recently added Daniel “roca” Gustaferri from CompLexity.
Cloud9 announced Alec “Slemmy” White as his replacement on Sunday.
According to DreamHack, top European sides were invited to the tournament initially but had eventually declined citing the pressures of the current Counter-Strike schedule. Those invites were then allocated to Splyce, Tempo Storm, and NRG Esports.
The three newly invited sides join initial invitees Counter Logic Gaming, Team Liquid and MLG Columbus champions Luminosity Gaming, as well as the two qualified sides Selfless Gaming and freakazoid’s former side, Cloud9.
The eight teams will compete for $100,000 next weekend during DreamHack’s North American debut in Austin.
