North American roster Team Liquid will use the services of Mareks “YEKINDAR” Gaļinskis at the forthcoming IEM Cologne 2022, the organization announced today on their Twitter handle. This is the second change under the Liquid camp which comes after signing Damian “daps” Steele for their head coach role.
YEKINDAR might have been the last resort for Team Liquid as they were indeed successful in finding a last minute scramble to lock their roster right before the deadline regulations set by ESL and Intel Extreme Masters.
The Latvian will replace Richard “shox” Papillon with whom Liquid parted ways with alongside their coach Eric “adreN” Hoag in the wake of lackluster showings across the past year.
Reports from earlier did suggest Liquid turning their heads to Janusz “Snax” Pogorzelski. Justin “jks” Savage but were unable to lock either of the players. YEKINDAR joins Liquid on loan after sitting on the bench of Outsiders aka ex-Virtus.pro following his decision to leave the team amid the ongoing Russian – Ukrainian conflict which did impact him as in a way of playing for a Russian organization.
Team Liquid have earned a direct invite to the group stage of IEM Cologne 2022 after being ranked second on the Road to Cologne track after FURIA Esports.
Team Liquid now have:
- Jonathan “EliGE” Jablonowski
- Nick “nitr0” Cannella
- Josh “oSee” Ohm
- Keith “NAF” Markovic
- Mareks “YEKINDAR” Gaļinskis (stand-in)
