Veteran Counter-Strike pro returns to action with NiP after nearly one-year hiatus

Ninjas in Pyjamas reinstated rifler Patrick “es3tag” Hansen to its active CS2 lineup today, Oct. 24.

The Dane will replace the former in-game leader Hampus Poser, who stayed in charge of the team for just four months in his second stint with the team. Es3tag, on the other hand, has been sitting on the NiP’s bench since December 2022 and apart from temporarily replacing rain in FaZe Clan at the BLAST Premier Spring Groups in January, has been totally inactive and is yet to play a professional CS2 match.

The removal of hampus comes less than a month after NiP hired the veteran coach Björn “⁠THREAT⁠” Pers to be the general manager of its CS2 team.

THREAT said right after he was appointed that he’d look to make some changes to the team for CS2 as he had seen a “clear lack of leadership and problems with the roles.”

The addition of es3tag for hampus is NiP’s second roster change in CS2 as the organization parted ways with Finnish IGL Aleksib shortly after the BLAST Paris Major in May to once again try hampus as the captain.

NiP, however, didn’t get any better after hampus replaced Aleksib and went on to crash out in the early stages of IEM Cologne in July and failed to qualify for the playoffs of ESL Pro League season 18 in September. They haven’t played a single match in CS2 yet, meaning hampus didn’t even get a chance in the new game.

It’s unclear if NiP will make es3tag its new captain for CS2 or if it will replace one more player to make room for a new IGL. The Swedish-Danish lineup is set to debut in CS2 on Oct. 26 against historic rival Fnatic at Roobet Cup 2023.