Gambit Esports’ Dota 2 roster has gone through several iterations across two different rosters over the last year. And after finishing in seventh place during the 2022 Dota Pro Circuit Winter Tour regional league in Eastern Europe, the organization is making another big change today.
AS Monaco Gambit, the org’s primary roster that was formed last February, has placed its entire lineup on the inactive roster until further notice.
This move comes after the team went 1-6 during the Division I matches, ending the first leg of the 2022 DPC season in seventh and facing relegation to Division II for the Spring Tour.
That is a steep drop from the org’s performance in the 2021 DPC, where the former roster was able to finish both seasons in third place and earned invites to both Majors. That fell apart prior to the WePlay AniMajor last June, however, when two core players, No[o]ne and SoNNeikO, refused to join the team at the event and eventually signed with Natus Vincere.
They would eventually be the first team eliminated at the AniMajor while playing with stand-ins and failed to qualify for The International 10. The team signed Albert “alberkaaa” Chernoivanov, Andrei “meLes” Romanov, and Sergey “HappyDyurara” Horonzhiy during the offseason, but those moves as a collective did nothing to improve the roster around Artem “Lorenof” Melnick and Aleksandr “Immersion” Khmelevskoi.
Even with this decision, AS Monaco Gambit isn’t the org’s only roster, as the team still retained a secondary team that kept the traditional Gambit Esports name. That squad, led by Gambit staple Vasilii “AfterLife” Shishkin, has also been competing in the 2022 DPC, finishing fifth in the EEU’s Division II.
No further information was given about the future of either roster, but it’s likely that multiple players will be replaced on AS Monaco Gambit moving forward, or the current secondary roster could be moved under the main team’s branding while the organization shuffles pieces around to try and improve their chances of getting at least one team back Division I for the eventual Summer Tour.
