NAVI Hope to Save their CS:GO Roster Despite Plans to Drop Russian Players

In a recent interview to Washington Post, Natus Vincere CEO Yevhen Zolotarov has announced that his organization is going to cut ties with “people who live in Russia and who pay taxes to the Russian Federation”. The Ukrainian club is ready to help these people to relocate, and Zolotarov believes that most of their players are ready to do it.

This decision may be damaging to the organization’s CS:GO roster, which is currently ranked #1 in the world by hltv. The team includes three Russian players – Denis "electroNic" Sharipov, Kirill "Boombl4" Mikhailov and Ilya "Perfecto" Zalutskiy, as well as two Ukrainian players Oleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev and Valerii "b1t" Vakhovskyi, and a Ukrainian coach Andrii "B1ad3" Horodenskyi.

When the Russian invasion of Ukraine began on February 24th, the team was participating in the playoffs stage of IEM XVI – Katowice. While they showed good results in group stage, in playoffs they lost their only match to G2 (0-2) and placed 3rd – 4th. During the event s1mple gave an emotional speech, describing his teammates as “real friends” and saying that the team need to show an example to the world by staying together. He added that all members of the team want “peace for Ukraine and the whole world”.

Tomorrow NAVI will begin competing in Group D of ESL Pro League 15, where they have been seeded alongside Heroic, Astralis, Complexity, Evil Geniuses, and AGO. Their first match is scheduled for March 30, 11:30 AM UK time – there they will compete with the Polish roster of AGO.

NAVI used to be based in Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, but due to the Russian invasion currently most of their staff and players are located in Poland. Majority of the club’s sponsors are from Europe or from the States, so the organization is doing fine financially and will be able to keep most of their staff and rosters. However, Yevhen Zolotarov is concerned with the future of their Dota 2 roster, since VALVE indefinitely postponed DPC in their region, and many local tournaments have been cancelled. The roster includes one Russian player, Alexey "Solo" Berezin, who is reportedly considering changing his citizenship.