Winstrike Dota roster to inactive, ArsZeeqq to rebuild squad

In a blog post on their website, the organisation explained that Arsenii "ArsZeeqq" Usov, joining as the new coach for Winstrike, will form a new lineup and the current roster have been benched.

The players now officially on the bench are:

• Zaur "Cooman" Shakhmurzaev
• Ilya "Lil" Ilyuk
• Alexander "Nofear" Churochkin
• Airat "Silent" Gaziev

It is not yet known if ArsZeeqq will seek to form a team around a core of these benched players or whether he will seek to bring in an all-new lineup.

Winstrike narrowly missed out on a place at The International 2019 after placing second to Natus Vincere in the CIS Qualifier who made a TI return after an absence of three years. 

The departure of Alexey "nongrata" Vasilyev following that event saw the roster rely on stand-ins for both the ESL One Hamburg 2019 Europe Qualifier and the MDL Chengdu Major CIS Open Qualifier, once again taking the silver medal in the first qualifier but failing to finish in the top four for the latter.

Their TI8 lineup managaged a respectable 9-12th place finish that year, contributing 97.7% of Winstrike's total Dota 2 prize money with just 1.5% of the total prize pool for the event.

As the Dota Pro Circuit 2019/20 begins, Winstrike will be hoping for a solid roster to try earn enough points to see themselves in contention for a spot at The International 2020.

With their Dota team inactive and the transfer of their PUBG roster to CrowCrowd back in August, Winstrike fans will have to look to FIFA, Fortnite and CS:GO for now. The Counter-Strike team is competing in the SECTOR: MOSTBET and WePlay! Forge of Masters Season 2: Online Stage tournaments with Abay "Hobbit" Khasenov loaned from HellRaisers and Aidyn "KrizzeN" Turlybekov as a stand-in.