The Finns from HAVU are in fantastic shape at the moment with the squad posting their fifth straight victory at CCT North Europe Series 2. Up till this Wednesday, they’ve taken down strong teams like OG, ex-Finest and forZe in their route to the semifinal stage, and today it was HEET’s turn to get eliminated.

Through an extremely close and competitive series on Dust2 and Ancient, HEET and HAVU fought each other where especially one veteran rifler in Jesse “zehN” Linjla were firing on all cylinders. The 31-year-old Finn and his heroics on both maps ended up being one of the deciding factor for HAVU’s impressive 2-0 win.

The Grand Final at CCT North is set to be played at 18:30 (CET) this Wednesday and will be between HAVU and the winner ENCE vs GamerLegion in the other semifinal.

HAVU vs HEET 2-0 | CCT North Europe Series 2

16-10 (Dust2) | {cflag:FI} zehN – 1.63 Rating / 26-13 K-D / 96.0 ADR

16-14 (Ancient) | {cflag:FI} xseveN – 1.35 Rating / 26-21 K-D / 92.1 ADR

MVP of the series: {cflag:FI} Jesse “zehN” Linjala – 1.44 Rating / 50-29 K-D / 88.1 ADR

zehN

In just 10 months since acquiring the previous GODSENT CS:GO roster, FPX have pulled out of the CS:GO esports scene completely, stating "limitations and difficulties during their remote management" as one reason for their decision. In those 10 months, FPX have had several ups and downs but ultimately failed to find any footing of success in the tournaments they played in. 

Their best result was a 9th-12th place finish in ESL Pro League Season 13 which netted them $25,000 USD.  Inspecting their other results, they are a mix of different looks in qualifiers, too few games and too many disappointing finishes in vital tournaments. 

This is now the second time that FPX have joined and left the CS:GO scene. Their first time was in 2020 when their signing of then Heroic would fail to materialize. 

It was confirmed in a [link:{"url":"https://youtu.be/rWLJoiHyz84","isNewTab":true,"text":"youtube video"}] uploaded by STYKO that the players are still under contract, but it is possible that one of them may already be on the way out as a report from [link:{"url":"https://draft5.gg/noticia/astralis-tem-interesse-em-farlig-awper-da-funplus-phoenix","isNewTab":true,"text":"Draft5"}] indicates that Astralis may be exploring the possibility of acquiring the 22-year-old Dane, Asger “Farlig” Jensen to their lineup.

You can find their full statement below. 

STYKO

Farlig

Maden

FunPlus Phoenix

G2 ran over BIG on Nuke with a 16-8 scoreline as JaCkz led the European side with a 1.85 Rating. The European Squad already sits comfortably in the RMR rankings but will look to secure as many points as possible. 

G2 got off to a great start on Nuke, converting a force buy on the second round before BIG went on the scoreboard. Despite a short improvement from syrsoN’s team, G2 cruised through their CT side, stringing together eight rounds in a row on their way to an 11-4 lead ending the first half. The second half started with all of the players on G2 had utility trying to make a remarkable play, but BIG won the pistol. The European squad were quick to prevent any comeback attempts from BIG and kept the map in check to secure their victory 8-16

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8-16 (Nuke) | JaCkz – 1.85 Rating / 27-11 K-D / 108.5 ADR

Copenhagen Flames – AURA (16-14) | {cflag:SE} hype – 1.37 Rating / 26-18 K-D / 93.9 ADR

Funplus Phoenix – mousesports (16-12) | {cflag:FI} zehN - 1.51 Rating / 30-15 K-D / 89.6 ADR

JaCkz

G2 Esports

Copenhagen Flames

mousesports

Astralis didn’t show up to today´s game against a strong roster from FunPlus Phoenix.

FPX bulldozed through a weak defensive line from Astralis in the first half on the new map Ancient, where the T side from FPX worked fantastically.

The great offense caused serious doubt in Astralis who didn’t manage to get a kill on the team before the fourth round.  

They managed to get themselves a 10-5 lead before the second half as the CT side, and the game only seemed to be a formality as Astralis didn’t play their best game.

In the second half as the CT side, the game picture was the same with FPX in control, and they manage to win six out of the eight rounds in the second half, enough to secure themselves the win 16-7 against Astralis.

Astralis – FunPlus Phoenix (0-1) | IEM Summer 2021

7-16 (Ancient) | {cflag:FI} zehN - 1.81 Rating / 28-13 K-D / 116.0 ADR

Astralis

FunPlus Phoenix is ready for the next round at the upper bracket in Flashpoint 3, as the European side secured a confident win against HYENAS in their opener at the event. A match, where the Danish roster clearly struggled against a well-playing FPX squad, which the dominant 2-0 result also implied.

HYENAS, which consists of profiled players like Philip 'aizy' Aistrup and Markus 'Kjaerbye' Kjærbye, didn’t manage to pressure FPX at any point in the match. Jesse “zehN” Linjala and company first dominated the Danes on their map pick of Vertigo, with a following devastating 16-6 defeat on Inferno to take the victory.

FPX will meet Anonymo in the upper quarterfinals, which is set to be played at Thursday (21:00 CET). 

FunPlus Phoenix – HYENAS (2-0) | Flashpoint 3

16-11 (Vertigo) | zehN – 1.45 Rating / 22-17 K-D / 108.7 ADR

16-6 (Inferno) | Maden – 1.58 Rating / 22-13 K-D / 88.7 ADR

Jesse “zehN” Linjala - 1.37 Rating / 37-28 K-D / 99.8 ADR

HYENAS

Yesterday, FunPlus Phoenix were up against the dominant Germans from BIG at the qualifier for IEM Summer 2021. The two teams competed for a spot at the $250.000 main event, which is set to kick off in June this year. The newly crowned Funspark ULTI EU Final winners from BIG were heavy favourites going into the match, however, it was the FPX gang who ended up with the win.

[slugRMA:funplus-phoenix-sends-big-lower-bracket-iem-summer-closed-qualifier]

The former GODSENT roster solidified the impressive victory by handing BIG a devastating 16-4 defeat on Vertigo. The highlight play of the map must have been this outstanding eco-round win, where especially Jesse "zehN" Linjala and Asger "Farlig" Jensen stepped up huge. 

[twitchClip:SparklingStrongDeerFailFish-RSEMkgpj1MfXzb2_]

[slugRMA:funplus-phoenix-beat-g2-qualify-iem-summer-2021]

[slugRMA:funplus-phoenix-announce-new-in-game-leader?fbclid=IwAR2VDBBdUu5UfEP03s8y9eV-jfLl935XG4t1zAnQ-ajbxwEn4uPlu29GJSw]

Farlig and company from FunPlus Phoenix have qualified themselves for the IEM Summer 2021 event following a 2-1 victory over the French-Balkan mixture from G2. NiKo and company will have to go through the lower bracket to get another shot at making it to the prominent event. On Wednesday at 13:30 (CET), they face off against FaZe Clan in the lower semi-finals for a spot in the lower final where the winners will book their ticket to the event.

Train: 16-6 | {cflag:FI} zehN – 1.71 Rating – 104.3 ADR – 21-10 K/D 

Mirage: 3-16 | {cflag:FR} AmaNEk – 1.73 Rating – 111.1 ADR – 19-13 K/D 

Inferno: 16-11| {cflag:FI} zehN – 1.72 Rating – 132.3 ADR – 31-19 K/D

The series started on FPX’s map pick of Train, where they earned a strong T-side score, 10-5, despite the map being one of the hardest to play as offense. Farlig and company came back after the switch with a stronger defense to claim the map and take a 1-0 series lead. Following a dominant 16-6 on Train, the game moved to G2’s map pick of Mirage, where NiKo and company bounced back and completely dominated FPX out of the server with an impressive 16-3 win.

In the final map on Inferno, we finally saw a competitive game compared to Train and Mirage. It was FPX who came out on top and closed it 16-11 to wrap up the series 2-1. FPX’s zehN played a massive role in the victory and delivered 31 frags to push his team across the finish line.

MVP: {cflag:FI} Jesse “zehN” Linjala – 1.47 Rating – 106.2 ADR – 65-43 K/D

Berlin International Gaming lost their third match at the tournament today against FunPlus Phoenix. The two teams gave each other a hard-fought match, but in the end, it was the new team FPX who sealed the deal.

On Inferno, the match went to overtime to find a winner. Here Jesse 'zehN' Linjala proved to be the big difference for FPX and helped his team to a narrow win on the first map. Worth mentioning was also Pavle 'Maden' Bošković, who made 34 kills during the map.

Another classic map was the setting for the second encounter. On Mirage it started horribly for BIG, who went behind 2-9 in no time. But then everything changed. As often in Counter-Strike, it is all about momentum. BIG won the next 15 rounds 14-1 and took home Mirage. A huge comeback was underway. 

Nuke was set as the decider. Here the downfall of FunPlus Phoenix continued. The old Godsent roster was missing their AWP'er Asger 'Farlig' Jensen who had been unusually quiet during the game. The Danish sniper had a difficult first half with only 4 kills. But then he went absolutely ballistic. FPX went from 7-13 to a 14-13 lead, while Farlig just added kills to his tally ending with 20 kills in the second half alone.

FunPlus Phoenix made the comeback and took home the victory, which sets them up to a thriller tomorrow against OG, where the winner will advance to the playoffs. BIG needs Complexity to lose twice if they should have any chance of advancing.

FunPlus Phoenix - BIG 2-1 (19-17, 10-16, 16-14)

MVP: Johannes 'tabseN' Wodarz - 1.26 rating / 74-63 / 91.3 ADR

tabseN

The favourites from Evil Geniuses have been eliminated from DreamHack Open January after a total collapse against the newly established FunPlus Phoenix. The strong American team couldn’t handle the two veterans in Jesse “zehN” Linjala and Chris “chrisJ” de Jong, who led FPX towards two strong and completely one-sided victories on Nuke and Inferno.

FunPlus Phoenix advance through to the semi-finals where they will meet BIG, while EG once again concludes an event, on European soil, empty handed.

FunPlus Phoenix – Evil Geniuses (2-0) |DreamHack Open January

16-3 (Nuke) | chrisJ - 1.79 Rating / 21-9 K-D / 105.1 ADR

16-8 (Inferno) | zehN – 1.35 Rating / 22-14 K-D / 96.3 ADR

[twitchClip:KnottyProductiveOcelotM4xHeh?filter]

Pavle “Maden” Bošković | 1.41 Rating / 37-27 K-D / 90.0 ADR / 81.4% KAST

[image:{"source":"cloudinary","publicId":"funplus_phoenix_ldags9","originalWidth":1200,"originalHeight":675,"cloudinaryAssetData":true,"cloudName":"pley-gg","format":"jpg","caption":"Credit: FunPlus Phoenix"}]

The newly founded FPX roster has qualified for the semifinals in their very first event.

EG IGL Peter "stanislaw" Jarguz reacts to the loss: 

chrisJ

Evil Geniuses

FunPlus Phoenix has just announced the signing of the former GODSENT quintet in Jesse "zehN" Linjala, Pavle "Maden" Bošković, Martin "STYKO" Styk, and Asger "farlig" Jensen. Alongside the four former GODSENT players, the organization has also signed Head Coach Jonatan "Devilwalk" Lundberg to call the shots. All five new members of the Chinese organization have signed a three-year contract. 

The organization is currently looking for and trialing its fifth and final member in a new in-game leader. Chris "chrisJ" de Jong has been rumored to be the final piece of the puzzle for the new roster and seeing that Mousesports announced his replacement in Frederik "acoR" Gyldstrand last week, it seems very plausible. 

[image:{"source":"cloudinary","publicId":"players/Copyright_-Helena-Kristiansson_-_chrisJ_jqdlnb","originalWidth":3840,"originalHeight":2160,"cloudinaryAssetData":true,"cloudName":"pley-gg","format":"jpg","caption":"Credit: Helena Kristiansson_ESL","alt":"chrisJ"}]

The Head Coach of the newly formed roster, "Devilwalk" has expressed the roster's goals for the upcoming 2021-season. He believes that FunPlus Phoenix has what it takes to become a tier-one team: 

"For us, 2020 has been a real development year. It has been the time where we have integrated into the top tier scene of CS:GO, and in 2021 we are bringing much clearer ambitions to reach higher to really compete within tier one CS,"

FunPlus Phoenix will have the chance to prove themselves from an early stage when debuting on Wednesday, January 27th. at the Dreamhack Open January event. 

GODSENT

The GODSENT Organization has today announced the transfer of their four remaining players and their coach. The Swedish Organization has sold their entire roster to another "big international esports Organization".

- The journey together with this team has been incredible and full of victorious moments. We are proud and grateful for what we have accomplished together, and we will forever be in their debt for how they have helped propel our organisation to the next level. This team will forever be enshrined in the history of our mighty organization. - Ludwig Sandgren and Henrik Denebrandt, CEO's.

While the new team is not yet revealed, it has been speculated that The Chinese organization FunPlus Phoenix is the buyer of the players.

[link:{"url":"https://pley.gg/news/funplus-phoenix-signs-godsent-roster/"}]

Back at the start of December, we sat down with GODSENT’s Jesse “zehN” Linjala, for an exclusive interview regarding his time at GODSENT. In the interview, the Finnish rifler touched on the ongoing ‘Online Era’ and what effects and consequences it has brought with it.

”During this pandemic, it’s been really hard for some of us, because we as well enjoy each other’s company and we’re driven on good energy. We always try to have good energy when we play, but that’s really hard when everything is online, and you basically can’t see each other, you just hear the voices. People can be unfocused and someone can be mega tired and you can’t really hype him up."

[image:{"source":"cloudinary","publicId":"Credit__GODSENT_ds8sou","originalWidth":500,"originalHeight":281,"cloudinaryAssetData":true,"cloudName":"pley-gg","format":"jpg","caption":"Credit: GODSENT"}]

“I also miss the environment being on LAN, when you have small butterflies in your stomach and feel the good excitement, and feel the game. In this Online Era, you’re more numb, you don’t feel the excitement that much, because you play from the comfort of your own home. It’s kind of sad and sometimes it can bring the mood down when there’s no hype.

But it’s different when you are winning. When we won against Astralis (DH Masters Winter), we had huge momentum and hype going on, same with our next two wins also. So, it’s really important for us.”

Read more. "GODSENT rifler: We want to break into Top 10"

[link:{"url":"https://pley.gg/news/zehn-godsents-ambition-want-break-into-top-10/"}]

The 29-year old rifler explains that Covid-19 made it impossible to go on bootcamp.

"We actually tried boot camping two months ago, but maden couldn’t attend because Serbia closed their borders. That maden couldn’t join, meant that we wouldn’t get the full use of it, because we were only four players and that’s kind of sad that only some of us can go, but some of can’t."

Watch an impressive fragmovie of the Finnish star here.

We have sat down with GODSENT’s experienced rifler Jesse “zehN” Linjala, in an interview, where the Finnish player opens up about GODSENT’s ambitions and goals, their impressive run in DreamHack Masters Winter, and also the difference between Kevin “kRYSTAL” Amend and Luka “emi” Vukovic’s leadership style.

GODSENT surprised everyone at DreamHack Masters Winter by putting up an impressive run, even though, coming into the event as the fifth lowest-ranked team out of the 16 attending teams. The underdogs were quickly dubbed as ‘The Danish Destroyer’ after taking down the top trio of Astralis, Heroic and North in strong fashion. 

The 29-year old Finn breaks down their DH Masters Winter campaign by explaining how being huge underdogs and playing with a stand-in IGL helped them to loosen up and establish a mindset where they had nothing to lose.

“When we faced Astralis we knew, that we had nothing to lose being heavy underdogs. However, it’s really easy for us to play as an underdog, because we have no pressure and then basically you can do even the stupidest play and still win a round and get momentum. This is what happened against Astralis, and then we beat North, and then we beat Heroic same way.”

The former HAVU player is confident that the CS:GO world haven’t seen the peak of GODSENT when being asked whether this GODSENT roster can advance and develop into a potential top tier team. The experienced rifler further states that they are looking for a new fifth to improve their chances. 

“Yeah, definitely. We have been talking for the last 6 months, that the next goal for us, is to break into Top 15 and then Top 10. We have defeated Heroic twice in a row, we beat an Astralis team that we never have won a map against, we beat mousesports, G2, fnatic, NiP. The keys for us will be to find to find consistency to actually do this more often. It means, that we have to play more together and have a stable fifth who can also hardcore frag or even carry in some maps if needed.”

I think it’s fair to say that we at moment, are trying out a new fifth for emi. We have agreed that now when we have no more games for the rest of the year, that we want to start off 2021 with a new fresh fifth. The season ends soon and people will bench players and players will be bought out and this is when we strike, so to speak. We are waiting a bit and then we try out a few other options, to see who’s the best fit for us. 

Massive clutch by zehN against mousesports.

[twitchClip:HedonisticCrepuscularNeanderthalStinkyCheese]

zehN breaks down the signing of emi as a stand-in and explains the difference between him and their former IGL Kevin “kRYSTAL” Amend. 

We had problems signing or buying anyone out of their contract because the season still is ongoing and we needed to have a player within two weeks for DreamHack Masters Winter and BLAST. We had to just take someone who was a free agent and not tied to any organizations, and that’s why we took emi for a few events. emi, didn’t necessarily change a lot, the only thing he did bring, was his own view. We put him on the same spots as kRYSTAL, and emi just adapted and did his own style basically. 

“He’s a different type of leader. He didn’t bring any special, that we haven’t seen before. He’s more strict when it comes to plays and he usually wants to go with his own vision and usually has the last word regarding strategy and ideas. We tried to tell him when a player plays a spot, he gathers a lot of information and where you sometimes can abuse this information doing a game. The difference between them may be that Kevin (kRYSTAL) listen more on what his players are telling him, where emi rather wants to go with the view he has.”

We asked him which leader style he believes, suits the team the best.

“I think it’s kind of 50-50. Sometimes it’s nice that there’s only one way, but how we have seen this year and where we play the best, is when there is a flow and everyone is listening to each other. Usually, we base our calls on some kind of information or common knowledge of the game. If there is someone having an idea, you just go with it. We have realised this is the best way for us to play since we have beaten really big names. 

kRYSTAL

GODSENT have been playing out of their mind at DreamHack Masters Winter, surprising everyone by defeating strong teams like Astralis, Heroic and North. GODSENT have played with a stand-in at IGL in Luka “emi” Vukovic which make this achievement much more impressive.

[twitchClip:RoughCrypticPorpoiseNinjaGrumpy]

GODSENT AWP’er Jesse “zehN” Linjala gave a post-game interview with the desk at DreamHack Masters Winter following their surprise victory against Heroic. The Finn expressed his opinion on their next opponent in mousesports and how they have to keep an extra eye on two individuals at mousesports. 

[twitchClip:BraveCrepuscularHamsterDxAbomb]

 You can watch the Semi-Final matchup between GODSENT and mousesports tomorrow at 13:00 (CET).

GODSENT won the Group B lower bracket semi-final against North on Nuke (16-9) and Overpass (16-13) despite a bad start to the series on the first map, where North won a close affair on Train (14-16).

The Danish squad got off well on the first map, but GODSENT answered back by convincingly taking their own favorite map pick on Nuke. It all came down to the decider on Overpass, where zehN and company were in the driving seat until North threatened to turn things around on the offense with a more aggressive playstyle, but the GODSENT squad managed to hold off the comeback attempt in the last moments.

Despite the loss, gade was the top player of the match and finished off with an overall rating of 1.23, 84,7 ADR, and a 72-57 score which unfortunately wasn’t enough to push his team through in the end.

GODSENT will take on Heroic in the single-elimination playoffs tomorrow at 13:00 (CEST).

gade

North

Heroic

24-year-old HAVU player Joonas “doto” Forss, will take Jani “Aerial” Jussila’s place at the upcoming IEM Beijing-Haidian event, it was revealed on the official website of the tournament.

doto has been the second-best performer for the HAVU team in the last three months and has been playing for the squad since September 2019. It’s still unclear whether doto has signed a permanent deal as neither of the organizations has made it clear.

ENCE announced last month that Aerial was on sick leave and would focus on his well-being. It was reported that the organization was targeting Jesse “zehN”, but it seems like he will stay with his current team GODSENT.

[link:{"url":"https://www.intelextrememasters.com/season-15/beijing/team/ence/"}]

doto

ENCE

HAVU

A disappointing day for the Danish team Heroic in today’s semi-final at Elisa Invitational 2, as they lose 2-0 against GODSENT on Nuke (19-16) and Overpass (16-12).

cadiaN and company didn’t have the luck on their side and nearly no one from the team seemed to have a good day, while GODSENT on the other side managed to win the game with team play and good retakes on sites.

Jesse ‘zehN’ Linjala was the best player in the game and stood out on the scoreboards with a 1.41 rating and 97.5 ADR.

GODSENT has now qualified for the BLAST Premier Fall 2020 Showdown with today's victory.

cadiaN

The Finnish roster ENCE looks to replace Jani "Aerial" Jussila and according to dbltap.com rumors say that they are targeting the rifler Jesse "zehN" Linjala. 

Aerial stepped down last week, meaning that ENCE is left with an incomplete roster of 4 players. Still seeking the success of 2019 and with one of their key players stepping down, ENCE is more desperate for change now than ever before. The transfer of zehN could be the missing piece of the puzzle, but whether or not the transfer is going to happen is questionable, since GODSENT is in negotiations regarding a complete roster transfer.

Despite the rifler being Finnish it would be his first time representing the ENCE organization and ZehN is seemingly a perfect fit for the lacking roster. With an official HLTV Ranking of 20, GODSENT has been playing Counter-Strike at a high level for some time, and a great amount of their recent success can be credited to zehN and his consistent performances.

Aerial

GODSENT outperformed Lyngby Vikings in their first match at Elisa Invitational 2. GODSENT played very well and was not at any time pressured by the Danish team. Their Finnish player zehn out fragged the server with a 1.75 rating and 26-13 k/d helping GODSENT to a convincing 16-7 win.

Asger “farlig” Jensen gave a confident post-game interview after the matchup against his fellow countrymen. “It was a pretty fun game, and I think we were just playing our own game and we didn’t have to break a sweat”

GODSENT will play either HAVU or Dignitas for a place in the semi finals.

Lyngby Vikings

After last week's surprising victory against FaZe, the GODSENT team has lost its momentum. Today's loss against North was the third defeat in a row for the Swedish-team.

After the match the Finnish lurker, Jesse "zehN" Linjala made the following comment on Twitter.

GODSENT will play either G2 or FaZe in a match for the 11th place and RMR-points. The match will take place on Friday.

	30 days	90 days
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zehN

Player stats

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The Flying Dutchman leads his team to victory at DH Open January

FunPlus Phoenix sign four former GODSENT players

Breaking: GODSENT sells entire roster

GODSENT veteran on ‘Online Era’: It’s been really hard for us

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GODSENT topple North in a three-map series to reach playoffs

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GODSENT take down world number #1

Ence targets zehN as a possible replacement for Aerial

farlig: We didn’t have to break a sweat

Frustrated zehN: We are like a broken car

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