Benched Heroes, the orgless CS:GO team headlined by former BIG and Fnatic AWPer Owen “smooya” Butterfield, is in talks to play for a British organization in the IEM Rio Major Europe Regional Major Ranking (RMR) event in October, according to Evgeniy “Aunkere” Karyat, one of the players on Benched Heroes.
Smooya, Aunkere, Rodion “fear” Smyk, Michał “MICHU” Müller, and Buğra “Calyx” Arkın made it to the Europe RMR after grabbing one of two spots left in the last open qualifier for European teams, surprising just about everybody in the CS:GO community. Smooya had revealed they wanted a sponsorship to pay for the travel to Malta in October, where the RMR will be held. And now, there seems to be an organization interested in acquiring their services, at least for this tournament.
Related: All CS:GO teams qualified for IEM Rio Major Europe RMR
“Smooya got contacted by [a] British organization,” Aunkere said on one of his latest livestreams, according to Escore News. “He and fear talked with them about signing us. In theory, if we come to an agreement on price, we will be competing under their tag instead of Benched Heroes. They gave us a really good offer, we are still thinking about it. If it will not work out, I will definitely share or at least hint at how much we got offered, but the sum is very good. I’m glad me and fear decided to make this team and such guys got interested in us.”
Benched Heroes earned a spot in the RMR after defeating Illuminar 2-1 in the fifth-sixth place decider. The mix team reverse swept the all-Polish squad and counted on a brilliant performance from smooya to push them across the finish line. The British AWPer had 87 kills and 64 deaths across the three maps and was by far the highest-rated player of the series.
Benched Heroes have been put in the Europe RMR B tournament alongside teams such as Natus Vincere, ENCE, Heroic, Vitality, OG, BIG, and MOUZ. Only eight of the 16 CS:GO squads in attendance will advance to IEM Rio Major in November.
Published: Sep 6, 2022 01:03 pm