Virtus pro, in my opinion, is the fifth best team of all time, only surpassed by Verygames/Titan, Fnatic(Olofm and KRiMZ), NiP(Fifflaren), and Fnatic(Dennis). Virtus pro has been in their worst slump ever.
Virtus pro is a team known for their agressive bullying tactics, but lately watching them seems like they are acting like another team. All of the players other than TaZ have been underpreforming compared to just five months ago. Today we will look at the other four players and what can be fixed within the team.
We’ll start with the player who has gotten slammed a lot lately, Snax. Snax started off the year with a terrible performance at Dreamhack Leipzig. Ever since then he has been consistently okay but is nowhere near his former level. He was the one who mounted a small comeback on Inferno against Fnatic, but his efforts were all for naught. Snax looks bad because he was the ONLY reason that they were once a top four team.Â
Just five months ago, Snax was a god of the game. Just look back at demos at ESL ESEA pro league Dubai invitational or Gfinity champion of champions and you see Snax’s true face. Yes, Snax is a shadow of his former self, but a top four team should have more depth than one great player
Pasha has be pretty average for the past year or so, with the occasional good performance like Faceit stage three. Pasha isn’t even the AWP player anymore. Pasha has shown that he can still have high impact but can’t have the fragging power of Pasha of the past. Pasha is one to consider kicking from the team in favour of a better player. It is still possible to save his talent, but it would take drastic changes in how Virtus pro works.
Byali has been straight trash for the past year. How often does he show up? Once every five games. How good is he when he shows up? Godlike. There is no excuse for byali. He has been in the team for two years by now, but he keeps getting worse. To make the team better, he HAS to be kicked for someone like oskar or mou. He was fine in the team when both Pasha and Snax were great players, but not that Snax is the superstar and no one else is even approaching his level, another star is needed.
Finally NEO. No matter how good he is, he will NEVER be kicked. NEO, the god of cs and the best player ever in the history of competitive CS, is in a slump. He was great during the late summer of last year but has since fallen off. NEO, along with TaZ, are the core of this team. They have to stay.
How can this team be fixed? First of all, it’s not the support players. It’s the stars. Snax is staying, as, in my eyes, he is a top five player of the last couple years. Compare losing Snax to late 2014 NiP losing GeT_RiGhT. TaZ and NEO stay, as not only are they the role players but also the core of this team. One day, however, one of these players or both will retire. That day will come within the upcoming years. Byali has to go, as he is way to inconsistent. Pasha can stay, but he has to rework the way that he plays. He has to be the JW of the team, showing up for some games but regularly putting up some impact rounds.
For this team to become to four, Snax has to improve. All of VP’s slumps and rises have been directly caused by Snax. If he is playing at the goldlike level that we know he can play at, near no single player can match him and the same can be said for the team. This is not one of those times.
In short, this could be a permanent slump if something internal is not changed. As one of the best teams of all time, I would think that they could bounce back, especially with veterans like TaZ and NEO, but changing who is awping might not be enough for this slump.
