Natus Vincere has confirmed today that Viktor “sdy” Orudzhev will be the CS:GO team’s fifth player at IEM Cologne in July.
This will be the second time that the Ukrainian rifler will stand in for NAVI. He played for them at the BLAST Premier Spring Final earlier this month and helped them win the event.
Like the first time, MAD Lions has agreed to loan sdy to NAVI free of charge. The 25-year-old has been transfer-listed since April when the European organization moved the entire roster to the bench and departed CS:GO.
Today’s confirmation of sdy comes as no surprise given that the rifler played well at the Spring Final and was praised by NAVI’s superstar NAVI Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev after the team won the event.
“I hope [sdy] will play in IEM Cologne, I think he played really great,” s1mple said on Sunday, June 19, after beating Vitality in the grand finals. “He had a lot of key rounds against OG and against Vitality today, a lot of multi-kills. He is a really calm guy and he is ready to learn, he knows how to listen to other people.”
As of this moment, it’s unclear whether NAVI is planning to keep sdy for the rest of the year or if the org is accessing other options.
The organization will have plenty of time to evaluate the roster after IEM Cologne, which will run from July 5 to 17, because of the start of the player break.
