TEK9 Week of News #2 - 1 - 6

Whilst this was originally meant to be a series that would go out each week, it has come to my attention that doing it bi-weekly might be a better option, due to not many teams having applied or addressed me about any changes in their teams in the week following the publication of the first article in this series. Therefore this article will conclude all changes from May 9th until May 22nd.

1. dOPE'HD Move Away From dYNZA, Pick Up dLeetr

The Dutch dOPE'HD team had attended The Party 9 with hopes of making it past the Group Stage and try to impress some of the critics, yet reality struck and having secured only one win in their five team group meant the team was out dead early and to compensate, the team made a line-up change.

Jerre "dYNZA" van den Berg was removed from the line-up due to not fitting in with the rest of the team. After having trialed Chris "dLeetr" Van der Schans for some two weeks, they found him to be the proper fit and were eager to continue on with him as part of the team. The team now wants to take revenge and attend some of the more local big Summer events, hoping to do better than before and prove they are an up and coming team.

Rolf "rL1m" Limburg
Jeroen "Stooker" Boer
Mark "VisioNn" Buitenkamp
Orrin "dEAd0" Megens
Chris "dLeetr" Van der Schans

The team's captain, Rolf "rL1m" Limburg, gave out the following statement about the changes:

" After having played together for quite some time, dOPE decided to remove dYNZA from the team after internal problems and disappointing results at The Party 9. Before the LAN, we were already experienced sporadic problems, with small fights happening. After The Party 9, we decided it would be best for the team to remove the player. As a replacement for dYNZA, we quickly ran into Chris 'dLeetr' Van der Schans, a player who fits well in our group and we saw play at The Party 9 and did well there. After 2 weeks of trialing, we had a good feeling about it and decided to take him aboard, hoping we can keep building on our team like this and attend some of the noteworthy Summer events."

Link: None given

2. insidaz Recover From HCC Mishap With Reboot

The Finnish insidaz line-up that attended the Helsinki COD Challenge was nothing more than a glorified mix, yet they still managed to make it to the TOP 4 of the tournament, after facing Team Phantasmagoria.fi in the Semi-Final. The core of the team was quite satisfied with this result and wanted to find some two new players to make a proper line-up again and be an active force in the Finnish community.

The first of two players to join the insidaz group is none other than former Epsilon-eSports player and HCC stand-in for team-velvet, Juuso "gnarly" Hakunti who had been without a team after the European Epsilon-eSports get reworked. At the same time, Heikki "hlbot" Leinonen also joins up with the team. He had been part of the REGret eSports team before they added the former Fnatic star.

Juuso "mosley" Ruoko
Jarkko "bleak" Rauhamäki
Jon "rion" Lindström
Juuso "gnarly" Hakunti
Heikki "hlbot" Leinonen

insidaz captain and front-runner, Jarkko "bleak" Rauhamäki, wanted to share some of his thoughts:

"After HCC we insidaz mutually agreed to disband since we really didn't even exist as a team, considering we had to attend as a mix. I was left a bit puzzled of what I would do in the future since the only team I had ever played for in CoD4 was now gone. I received some interesting opportunities on behalf of already existing teams but eventually I decided it wasn't what I wanted. After talking with mainly mosley and rion we came to the idea of forming a new finnish team. After contemplating several different lineups we have now settled for this. Gnarly and hlbot are both experienced players and if things turn right we should be able to come back more prosperous than ever."


Link: None given

3. vitalGaming Pick Up Swedish COD4 Team

The Dutch vitalGaming organisation has opted to keep active with Call of Duty 4 and in doing so, they have picked up a new team to represent them from now on. Their previous team had left the organisation and they managed to come across a group of Swedes who were thrilled to join up.

The team consists out of former Value-Gaming as well as AIMAZING players and wants to attend both online as well as offline events in the future. A line-up change was also on the table, as Isak "Phyze" Larsson wanted to stop with the game and was replaced by Philip "Phizzle" Axelson, regarded as being an up & coming talent by his new team mates.

joakim "ChipS" Hjort
jonathan "JONTS" Robertsson
Micke "MICKEE" Ohlsson
Philip "Phizzle" Axelsson
Lars "SanCti" Emesiöö

Lars "SanCti" Emesiöö wanted to express his thanks to his new organisation through a statement:

" After the line up in vitalGaming ran in to some bumps and the moral went down noski looked after a new team. We said there was no use in going on. but when we foulded Chips saw that i was looking for team and asked me to trail for them. (MICKEE,Chips,jONTE,Phizzle) and just after a few game it feelt realy good. and when i got picked up we started talking about orgs. and vitalGaming for me was a clear first pick, so i asked AkirA if there was any place for us to join the org. and here we are today, now we are looking ahead For some LANS and online achievements under the vitalGaming flag. we cant be more happy that a great org like vitalGaming gives us a chanse and me a second chanse to play for them."


Link: vitalGaming Announcement

4. etek.uk Add welch, Whilst Removing dozzy

The British etek.uk side came together through friendship and formed a line-up to play Call of Duty 4 with, setting Academy as one of their goals. Eventually the team had a complete set of players, as soon as Andy "ztu" Hamilton agreed with becoming part of the team. Unfortunately, some problems arose shortly after.

Patrick "dozzy" Hill was part of the team from quite early onwards, but his activity and motivation seemed to have dropped and the remaining members of the team decided to put him on non-active for the time being. This meant a replacement was needed and luckily, Charlie "welch" Welch was another player they already knew and seemed to fit in with the team quite well.

Carl "Carl" Lumley
Luke "willzEY" Gammer
Conor "CONZOR" Johnston
Andy "ztu" Hamilton
Charlie "welch" Welch

Patrick "dozzy" Hill (Back-up)

Conor "CONZOR" Johnston was at hand to provide TEK9 with some words about the goings-on in the team:

" Myself willzEY and Carl, have all been very good friends for around a year now, we have tried teams in the past but none seemed to work out. We decided to give it a go and stick together through thick and thin, we all are trying are best, we want to be academy asap, I knew dozzy for a while also, he lives in the same area as me, so I thought to pick him up, we noticed that the team spirit was very good, in teamspeak the atmosphere is amazing, everyone’s calm, now we just needed a 5th, we found ztu, we thought this would be a good pickup because he’s a sound lad and skilled, also he’s Scottish, now we have Irish English and Scottish. The team works well together and we are progressing at a high rate, sadly due to exams dozzy had to be place backup as his activity decreased quite a bit, he was fine with this, now we needed a new stable 5th to fit in.. The I suggested welch, I have known him for a good while and before we started the team I had been mixing quite a bit with him, I knew what he was capable of, I convinced the team to try him, turns out he fitted in perfect!"

Link: None given

5. Czech-German Mix Becomes Part of Insenia

A very unusual match-up of Czech as well as German players has been playing together as of late and found themselves an organisation to be part of. However, they did not only join up with the Czech Insenia organisation, as they also had some line-up changes due to Jan "hAAzy" Moticak leaving.

His position was quickly filled by picking up Honza "fcRR" Kuchar who had been asked by someone in the team to return from inactivity as part of the team, which he did. Perhaps the biggest name in the team is the one of former Team Thermaltake Elias "BudzR" Bork who attended some big events and was a regular in the German ESL Pro Series for some time.

Martin "wellz" Simecka
Leos "bANG" Hampl
Honza "fcRR" Kuchar
Elias "BudzR" Bork
 Lukas "lukez" Terihaj

Martin "wellz" Simecka, one of two Czech players in the team, gave out a statement about the changes in the team:

" Were very happy that we can play for one of the beste Czech Organisations. We think that were a very strong team and have a big level. In our future we want to join cod.academy and preinvite and go to all ddecent lans in europe. Surely we attend all Czech Lans and want to get some good Scores. But our first thing is , the Excello Bigfoot Challenge, at this Cup we want to show the whole CoD4 Scene that were a very serious team and can hold against preinvite and invite teams."

Link: Insenia Announcement