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In a tweet today, Finnish Counter Strike-Global Offensive team ENCE Esports announced Aleksi "Aleksib" Virolainen will not be a part of their active roster after the conclusion of current CSGO StarLadder Berlin Major. Taking his place will be another Finn and one of the country's most popular and top players Miika "SunNy" Kempii.
Though there were some reports of SuNny joining ENCE earlier, the timing of the announcement does raise a few eyebrows considering ENCE will start their 2019 Berlin Major campaign in less than five days.
SuNny, who previously played for European giants Mousesports from August 2017 to Jan 2019, was placed on bench since March 14, alongside teammate Tomas "OsKar" Stastny, who then later joined Team HellRaisers, after the Germany based organization decided to overhaul their roster when they failed to qualify for IEM Katowice 2019 major.
SunNy had a mixed 2018, averaging 1.06 HLTV rating with some highs including winning Starseries I-League Season 4 & ESL One New York 2018, but things soon felt apart for the team after a few group stage exits including StarSeries I-League Season 6 and ECS Season 6 Finals in later part of the year.
SuNny, in a tweet today, said he was "proud" and "happy" to represent ENCE and that it was "homecoming" for him. This is not the first time though that he has played for ENCE, he also had a stint with them in as early as 2013, with current ENCE player Aleksi "allu" Jalli, before joining Penta and Mouseports.
Out of the blue
Making room for SuNny will be none other than current team IGL(In Game Leader), Aleksi "Aleksib" Virolainen. A rarity in today's time, Aleksib was a decent fragger, averaging 0.98 HTLV rating and an excellent IGL and one of the top reason why ENCE reached #2 in HTLV World Rankings.
In his TwitLonger post, Aleksib said the news came "out of blue" for him and that he will try to make his last tournament with ENCE look "EZ" one more time. He also said he was still eager to continuing playing and that he is open to "international offers".
ENCE was formed in early 2018 with former FaZe and veteran player Aleksi "allu" Jalli with a full Finnish roster. The roster found success early with wins in StarSeries I-League Season 6 and Dreamhack Open Winter 2018, and continued with an impressive performance at the start of 2019 that saw them place runners up at IEM Katowice Major 2019.
However, the rest of the year proved average for them with some group exits and some decent performances, but ended their pre-Major season with a better second place standing in IEM Chicago 2019, losing to current #1 Team Liquid.
The change marks another increased in the trend of CS-GO teams going for more firepower rather than tactical prowess. Faze Esports did it when they replaced their long time IGL Finn "Karrigan" Andersen in late 2018. However the move proved disastrous for FaZe as they were soon forced to make another roster change, bringing veteran Polish IGL Filip "Neo" Kubski in the team. Only time will tell whether the change makes it more "EZ4ENCE" or the team goes down the FaZe path.
