Guardian says he’ll take a break from professional CS:GO until next Major

Former Natus Vincere AWPer Ladislav “Guardian” Kovács plans to take a temporary absence from competitive CS:GO until the next Major, which is set to take place from May 16 to 24. 

Guardian hasn’t played for a professional team since his removal from Na’Vi on Jan. 24, where he was replaced by up and coming 20-year-old rifler Ilya “Perfecto” Zalutskiy from Syman. He said on stream earlier today that he’ll be weighing his options.

Since he won’t be competing, Guardian said that he’ll focus on streaming. “I will take a break until the next Major, and then after the Major, I will see,” Guardian said. “But yeah, I will stream.”

Although Guardian was considered one of the best AWPers in the world over the last few years, his recent form has steeply declined. Last year was arguably his worst year in terms of individual performance. It was the only year since 2013 in which he wasn’t named one of the best players in the world, according to HLTV. At the most recent event that he attended with Na’Vi, EPICENTER, he statistically had the worst individual performance on Na’Vi. 

But Guardian is an esteemed CS:GO veteran who could likely improve lower-level teams or even squads at the professional level. He could make his return later this year or retire like former Titan player Edouard “SmithZz” Dubourdeaux announced yesterday.