Ropz out of early stages of IEM Katowice due to COVID

FaZe Clan’s new addition to its CS:GO roster, Robin “⁠ropz⁠” Kool, tested positive for COVID-19 today, just six days away from the start of IEM Katowice. He won’t play until at least Feb. 19, when his 10-day quarantine period ends, if he’s recovered by then.

The news came from ropz himself and FaZe is yet to reveal who will sub in for him during IEM Katowice’s play-in stage, which kicks off on Tuesday, Feb. 15. FaZe will be one of the 16 teams battling for the eight spots in the main event.

“Me and the team arrived at our bootcamp for IEM Katowice on Monday,” ropz said. “Today I unfortunately tested positive for COVID, having developed some symptoms too.”I won’t be able to start on day one at IEM but could come later depending on my recovery and our team’s progress. I have started my quarantine to keep everyone safe, it will end on the 19th of February.”

The Estonian star signed with FaZe to replace Olof “olofmeister” Kajbjer at the start of the year following a long tenure with mousesports. He was brought in to try to take the international squad to another level and assist them in winning some of the biggest CS:GO tournaments in the world.

Ropz already made a good impression in the BLAST Premier Spring Groups last week when he helped FaZe qualify for the Spring Finals. The 22-year-old averaged a 1.26 rating throughout the tournament, according to HLTV, and was the team’s best player, statistically speaking.

FaZe’s odds of making a deep run at IEM Katowice are considerably lower now that ropz won’t play in the first days of the competition and Finn “karrigan” Andersen and crew will have to play with an emergency stand-in. It’s possible that the organization could call on olofmeister to assist the squad once again.

IEM Katowice’s play-in stage will use a double-elimination format and FaZe are set to debut against Sprout on Feb. 15 at 5:15am CT. If they advance to the main event, they’ll still have to play some matches without ropz since it starts on Feb. 17 and his quarantine ends on Feb. 19 at the earliest.