Complexity will replace MAD Lions in European Minor Closed Qualifiers
Complexity have been announced as replacement team for MAD Lions at Europe Minor Closed Qualifier – ESL One Rio 2020, which is slated to begin this Saturday, March 7.
MAD Lions have announced they have decided to withdraw from participating at the Europe Minor Closed Qualifier – ESL One Rio 2020 as they were unable to find a suitable replacement for Nicolai "HUNDEN" Petersen, whom the Danish squad benched earlier on Thursday due to internal issues in the squad.
Initially, it was reported that the Spanish esports organisation had their eyes set on Copengahen Flames CS:GO member Asger "AcilioN" Larsen, however, they failed to secure the deal in time to field a full roster for the Minor qualifiers.
Whether MAD Lions will end up signing AcilioN remains to be seen, as there were no official announcements from the team. That said, reliable sources claimed that MAD Lions are in the latter stages of acquiring AcilioN, who is currently benched by his team and is looking for a new home.
"In the lead up to the start of the new FLASHPOINT season, Hunden and the team have come to the mutual decision that he move into a management role inside our organization," said MAD Lions spokesperson, who provided an update on the situation.
"We are currently finalizing our roster, and will provide an update as soon as we can."
Complexity are currently ranked 15th in the world and have participated in three out of four open qualifiers for Europe Minor Closed Qualifier, however, failed to go the distance in either of them.
In their first attempts, Benjamin "blameF" Bremer and co. defeated eXploit, Giants Gaming, APOLOGIS and SKADE, but fell flat against BIG (1-2) in the finals. At the second qualifiers, Complexity defeated BARTOSZE, and Sigma, but lost to PACT in the Round of 16. The North American organisation decided to skip the third qualifiers and took another swing at the fourth instalment of the event, where they cruised by Ratard, Stifmeister Gaming, AVEZ and Sinners, but once more fell flat in the final match, this time against SMASH Esports.
Despite their poor displays in the online tournaments, Complexity have shown a completely different form in LAN, having survived the "group of death" at the BLAST Premier: Spring 2020 Regular season, where they defeated Astralis (2-0) and Team Vitality (2-0).
Although Complexity failed to derail 2020 IEM Katowice champions Natus Vincere (0-2) in the grand finals, blameF and his squad still secured promotion into Spring 2020 Finals, where they will compete for US $750,000 prize pool against NaVi, Team Liquid, OG, FaZe Clan, G2 Esports and two top teams from the Showdown event.
Following their incredible display at BLAST, Complexity also participated at DreamHack Open Anaheim, where they secured a spot in the semi-finals following two convincing wins over MiBR. There, however, Complexity lost to MiBR's compatriots FURIA Esports, who reverse-swept them with 16-11 win on Overpass and 16-14 on Nuke. Complexity finished DreamHack Open Anaheim at a third-fourth place, which remains one of the team's best results since they rebuilt their CS:GO roster in September.
