The former Fnatic and Ninjas in Pyjamas player, Simon "twist" Eliasson has found himself a new home on the Israeli Team Finest.

Another Swede Niclas "PlesseN" Plessen has also been announced on the roster, which peaked in 36th place on the World Ranking last year. The team has had a troublesome 2021 with 16 different players on the roster throughout the year. 

twist

PlesseN

anarkez

shokz

kreaz

Finest

Finn “karrigan” Andersen and his troops are ready for the decider match

[slugORMA:{"slug":"live-faze-vs-furia","isNewTab":false}]

in Group B against the powerful Brazilians from FURIA. That became a reality this evening, due to FaZe’s strong victory over Dignitas in the thrilling three-map thriller.

Dignitas, who played with Simon “twist” Eliasson as a stand-in, displayed an impressive showing against the profiled European team. Especially twist was a delight to the eye, with the former NIP player playing some insane Counter-Strike, despite only having played two official maps the last month.

However, there was also a strong player on the other side of the server. In fact, a player with a nearly identical in-game name - Because the Canadian superstar Russel “Twistzz” Van Dulken was also firing all on cylinders, and the mechanical rifler continued his astounding performance from yesterday by leading FaZe to a vital 2-1 victory today.

FaZe – Dignitas (2-1) | Gamers Without Borders

16-14 (Nuke) | broky – 1.44 Rating / 29-15 K-D / 87.4 ADR

10-16 (Ancient) | twist – 1.64 Rating / 28-14 K-D / 116.8 ADR

16-13 (Overpass) | twist – 1.36 Rating / 24-18 – K-D / 102.ADR

Russel “Twistzz” Van Dulken – 1.23 Rating / 63-51 K-D / 83.1 ADR

Twistzz

karrigan

FaZe

Team Dignitas

A new profiled roster has seen the light in the CS:GO landscape, as the former c0ntact coach Neil "⁠NeiL_M⁠" Murphy has joined forces with a mix of Swedish and Lithuanian players. The new team haven’t been signed by an organization yet and will play under the banner of MANS NOT HOT.

The Swedish-Lithuanian roster is led by the former NIP player Simon "⁠twist⁠" Eliasson and the 20-year-old Rokas "⁠EspiranTo⁠" Milasauskas, who both looks to be the highlight players on the newly-created squad. The duo is joined by the Swedes Robin "⁠robiin⁠" Sjögren and Denis "⁠grux⁠" Gutaj, while EspiranTo’s countryman Armandas "⁠maty⁠" Kneita round up the roster.

Head coach, NeiL_M has given the following statement to HLTV: 

- Our goals are simple, to create a new international home where each player is at his highest peak in their most impactful role to shine. All five players here are slotted into the most natural role that they wanted, we've already started to practice as much as possible. We're ready to compete in events to grind our way up the ladder and prove who we are.

{cflag:LT} Rokas "⁠EspiranTo⁠" Milasauskas

EspiranTo

grux

robiin

maty

There has not been shortage of changes on the MAD Lions roster in the past year. Lucas "Bubzkji" Andersen was transfered to Astralis, while AWP'er Frederik "acoR" Gyldstrand was sold to mousesports earlier this year. This week the roster again sold out of their Danish treasure with Rasmus "sjuush" Beck and Ismail "refrezh" Ali leaving the roster for Heroic.

[image:{"source":"cloudinary","publicId":"heroic_signings_kblt4n","originalWidth":1920,"originalHeight":1080,"cloudinaryAssetData":true,"cloudName":"pley-gg","format":"jpg","caption":"Credit: Heroic"}]

According to the website 1pv.fr, the Spanish Organization will now turn away from fielding a purely Danish roster in the future. A change of direction, that will remove Fredrik "roeJ" Jørgensen and Rasmus "HooXi" Nielsen from the roster, while keeping Thomas "TMB" Bundsbæk on the team. Names as Simon "twist" Eliasson, Michał "MICHU" Müller, Bogdan "xsepower" Chernikov are named as possible replacements, but nothing has been settled yet.

[link:{"url":"https://www.1pv.fr/fr/news/101464-mad-lions-to-go-international-roej-hooxi-to-be-benched","text":"Read the full story here."}]

sjuush

roeJ

MICHU

xsepower

MAD Lions

Simon “twist” Eliasson is no longer a Ninja as he has been released from his contract with the Swedish organization, he announced on Twitter. The Swedish player had been moved from NiP’s active roster to the sideline ahead of BLAST Premier Spring Groups, in which Erik “ztr” Gustafsson stepped in as a stand-in.

The 26-year-old joined the Swedish organization back in September 2019 in a transfer from fnatic as an AWPer, but ended up being transitioned to a rifling role as Tim “nawwk” Jonasson took over as the main AWPer. The organization decided to move twist to the sidelines due to poor recent results as the motivation behind the change.

It’s still unclear whether ztr will take over twist’s spot permanently. NiP’s next match will be in the Play-in stage of IEM Katowice next week.

Ninjas in Pyjamas

Whilst we see the players when they often fight battles on the server and clutch at straws to edge out a win against the opponents, we rarely get to see or hear about them outside of the game. In a video on Ninjas in Pyjamas' Youtube channel NiP player Simon "twist" Eliasson and Head Coach Björn "THREAT" Pers test their mutual agreement on each others strengths and weaknesses. 

The aim of the game is to point out who the statement fits and hopefully, the two of them can agree on the person that they have both chosen. 

Watch the entertaining video and get to know a little bit more about two key figures in the NiP roster right here: 

There have been plenty of iconic moments in Counter-Strike over the past years, but which play is the all-time best and most remarkable? Find out what pro players like “twist”, “coldzera”, and “tabseN” thinks are the best plays.  

tabseN

apEX

coldzera

Simon “twist” Eliasson demonstrated the sneaky-peeky phrase very well with a cool play against Evil Geniuses in the second map of the group A lower bracket round 1.

The Swedish NiP player managed to go all the way to the T-area without getting seen by EG. Watch what he does when he spots Stanislaw from the enemy team:

stanislaw

Evil Geniuses

In a recent interview, betway esports asks a couple of different pro players who they think are the best overall player in Counter-Strike.

“If I would have to pick one player, of course, he is not perfect in some ways, but I would say NiKo. For sure NiKo, because he can play AWP, he can kill with any pistol, he can basically play anything and win any clutch. When he is in the clutch, you always believe he can win the round because I know how he is thinking, how he understands the game, and the way he works with the information” GuardiaN said. “With the AWP you can see how well he is playing on certain maps. Of course, is not always perfect, but nobody is perfect,” he stated.

Watch the rest of the interview and find out who shox, THREAT, coldzera, twist, tabseN, and apex thinks are the best all-round player in CS:GO:

NiKo

shox

 Fredrik “REZ” Sterner and company turn the tables as they continue their good form by eliminating fnatic in the lower bracket semi-final. This victory secured NiP a spot in the lower bracket final against Heroic tomorrow. 

The Swedish “El Clasico” ended 2-1 in maps for NiP and the maps being played were Overpass, Inferno, and Vertigo. 25 years old twist lead the way for victory by topping the scoreboard with an ADR of 91.2, and rating on 1.17.

Ninjas in Pyjamas will face the Danish team Heroic tomorrow in the lower bracket final. 

	30 days	90 days
Fixture count	4	4
Maps count	5	5

twist

Player stats

Articles mentioning twist

Swedish duo joins Finest

FaZe eliminate Swedes to advance at Gamers Without Borders

Former NIP profile and promising rifler create new team

Media: Mad Lions turns international

twist: I’m eager to get back to competition

Video: Get to know Twist and THREAT better

Video: What is the all-time most iconic play?

Video: twist goes sneaky peeky

GuardiaN: I would say NiKo is the best overall player

Ninjas in Pyjamas win the Swedish battle

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