Riot Squad part ways with coach weber
Riot Squad Esports have announced mutual parting with their CS:GO head coach Brandon "weber" Weber after just over five months since his arrival at the North American esports organization.
The British coach and analyst joined Riot Squad Esports on August 24, 2019, as a replacement for Josh "shinobi" Abastado, who transitioned Riot Squad Academy coach position. Unfortunately, weber's five-month tenure with the North American organization has come to an end this Wednesday, January 29, when Riot Squad announced the mutual parting on their official Twitter page.
During his five-month stint with Riot Squad, weber helped his team reach some remarkable results, including a second-place finish at the ESEA MDL Season 32 Global Challenge and successful qualification for the ESL Pro League Season 10 relegation, before the tournament was cancelled. Earlier this month, Riot Squad also made it to the DreamHack Open Anaheim 2020: North American Qualifiers where they narrowly lost out on punching their ticket for the main event and finished top-four at WINNERS League – Season 3: North America Invite Division earlier last week.
Despite the solid results, however, weber decided to step down as a head coach of Riot Squad in a bid to find his home in a better team which would allow him to reach his goals. In a Twitter post, which he made shortly after the announcement of his departure, weber said:
"Stepped down as coach of Riot Squad – I learnt a considerable amount in my time there and I can't thank them enough, I'm certain they'll progress into a better team and reach their goals! I am still looking to coach/ be an analyst for a team and anyone interested DM me."
Weber started his Counter-Strike career in 2010, when he played Counter-Strike: Source for Team Dignitas, and later joined up with Rasta.Xd and Mtw. In August 2012, weber made his first appearance in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, when he joined FM eSports. He later played for Anexis eSports, VEETTiGA, The Lone Rangers, EZSkins.com, Method and Team Endpoint, before joining Riot Squad as a head coach.
The news of weber's departure comes shortly after Riot Squad parted ways with their former In-Game-Leader Pujan "FNS" Mehta. In a statement FNS made after his departure from the team, the Canadian strategist claimed he decided to leave the team due to internal turmoil, which was caused by his plans of making three roster changes which did not go down well with his teammates.
"I lost faith in the team doing anything past what we've already accomplished, and essentially gave up, and tried to make 3 changes. This led to players aligning against me due to my lack of "caring" for the past month and the organization chose to release me as I asked them to. Made sense for both parties to move forward this way. Making that many changes is way too difficult without people fighting back. Regardless, I'm perfectly fine with this outcome," said FNS.
With the departure of weber and FNS, Riot Squad is now left with four players in Peter "ptr" Gurney, Mitch "mitch" Semago, Austin "crashies" Roberts and Jonathan "Jonji" Carey. The team also announced ptr will take over as the new IGL.
The North American squad will make their next appearance in a CS:GO competitive environment on Saturday, February 1, when Riot Squad will play in the ESEA Season 33: Premier Division – North America.
The said tournament will feature 21 North American teams competing for the largest slice of US $1,500 prize pool and a spot in the S33 Global Challenge, which will take off later this year with $75,000 in the prize pot.
Riot Squad CS:GO team:
Peter "ptr" Gurney – IGL
Mitch "mitch" Semago
Jonathan "Jonji" Carey
Austin "crashies" Roberts
