HAVU has announced on its official Twitter account that they have secured a full Finnish roster. 

The newly established lineup includes Jussi "Airax" Airaksinen, Sami "xseveN" Laasanen, Matias "Banjo" Kivistö, Jani "Aerial" Jussila, and Otto "ottoNd" Sihvo, with Mikko “xartE” Välima as their coach. The team had been playing together for a bit already but now they have made it official. Despite not having played together for over a month, the team made it to the Round of 16 in the CCT West Europe Series 2, where BIG eliminated them.

Two of their newest signings Matias "Banjo" Kivistö and Jussi "Airax" Airaksinen are motivated and ready to improve as they will be joining the world's number 69 in HAVU.

Feels good to play with a full Finnish roster again. I'm really motivated to improve and play with more experienced players and learn from them, Banjo [link:{"url":"https://havu.gg/blogs/news/welcome-ottond-airax-banjo","isNewTab":true,"text":"said"}] after joining HAVU.

I'm super excited to join HAVU and for getting the opportunity to play with such experienced and good players! There's a lot of work to do but we have one goal in common, and we want to reach it together, Airax said. 

It's the third time that Otto "ottoNd" Sihvo is coming back to his former team HAVU. This time, the 25-year-old reunites with his old friend after a short stint at KOVA. KOVA now is without a lineup and any organization to back them up which is the main reason for ottoNd´s return.

With no upcoming matches for the HAVU side, it's yet to be announced when we get the new lineup in action. However, with minor tournaments coming up in the upcoming weeks, HAVU could be on the list of participants. 

ottoNd

Airax

Banjo

HAVU

It was a heavily decimated Fnatic roster who arrived in Düsseldorf last week to compete at the 15th season of ESL Pro League. The Swedish-based team were set to play without their star duo in Brollan and KRIMZ, as they also lacked a permanent AWPer due to the release of Smooya.

Fnatic ended up picking their two Fnatic youngsters, Peppzor and Banjo, alongside the former Complexity AWPer, poizon, as replacements for the $823.000 event. Something that worked out pretty well for Fnatic, as they managed to take down G2, MOUZ and LFO to secure a playoff spot. 

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Before the final round of Group A, Fnatic head coach, Jamie “keita” Hall spoke with ESL to talk about playing with three stand-ins and still managing to qualify for playoffs.

- I can’t say that we had the time to have 1-on-1 sessions with them (stand-ins). He literally landed on the day we were playing. We have been lucky that we had late games so we could practise before the games, looking at previous games and correcting stuff as we go, keita said to ESL and continued:

- They have just done a great job adapting on the fly, learning from their mistakes and improving their confidence as they go, the Fnatic head coach concluded.

You can watch a part of the interview down below. Here keita also touches on his coaching style and how he sees himself as a coach.

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1. NIP | 12 Points / +45 Round difference

2. Entropic | 12 Points / +18 Round difference

3. Fnatic | 9 Points / +15 Round difference

6. Looking For OG | 0 / -77 Round difference

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Brollan

KRIMZ

poizon

Peppzor

smooya

Fnatic

The fight for 2nd and 3rd place is on in Group A at ESL Pro League after NIP earlier today secured first place in the group.

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Two of the contenders went head to head in the second match of today, where Fnatic had the opportunity to take a big step towards reaching the playoff stage with a win. On the other side of the server, MOUZ needed a win to stay alive after having already lost twice in the group.

An Aurimas 'Bymas' Pipiras in top shape made it a possible scenario for MOUZ to take the win on the first map. On Nuke the Lithuanian was sensational and was ripping the defense from Fnatic apart in the first half. MOUZ continued after the break and won convincingly.

Fnatic went on to Inferno, where the assembled roster found momentum. William 'mezii' Merriman came in handy for Fnatic, who took control at the end of the map. A 16-10 win gave way for Mirage as the decider.

Here one of the new names in the Fnatic lineup, Matias 'Banjo' Kivistö showed up big time. In the first half, the Finn dug deep with a 17-5 K-D scoreline. An impressive performance from the stand-in player, who could see his team leading 10-5 at the break.

The second half started with a huge blow for MOUZ. A technical issue with NBK-'s screen left him playing while looking at a teammate's screen in a 1vs2 situation. The Frenchman lost the clutch attempt and MOUZ were on their way out of ESL Pro League. Valentin "poizon" Vasilev also chipped in to complete the huge impact made by the stand-ins for Fnatic, who won Mirage and is now very close to advancement.

MOUZ on the other hand is almost out of ESL Pro League. They need a lot of results to go their way later tonight and tomorrow to qualify.

Fnatic – MOUZ 2-1 | ESL Pro League Season 15 (Group A)

9-16 (Nuke) | {cflag:LT} Bymas – 1.80 Rating / 29-13 K-D / 127.7 ADR

16-10 (Inferno) | {cflag:GB} mezii- – 1.36 Rating / 24-14 K-D / 83.9 ADR 

16-7 (Mirage) | {cflag:FI} Banjo – 1.51 Rating / 24-10 K-D / 83.3 ADR

MVP: {cflag:LT} Aurimas 'Bymas' Pipiras – 1.35 Rating / 66-47 K-D / 97.2 ADR

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mezii

MOUZ

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