What does it take to become the best team in the world in one the oldest esports games out there? We’ll have to ask Heroic, the Danish team who are also the current world ranking leaders in Counter Strike: Global Offensive.

The Unlikely Story Of Heroic

But, before we get the chance to talk to them and pick their brains, let’s observe the facts. The team has been around since 2016., and have changed their roster and coaches multiple times during that period, which is not all that unusual, as you probably know if you are an esports fan. They have been watching their fellow countrymen and fierce rivals Astralis at the number one spot for a long time now, but this is the first time in their history they themselves have managed to reach no.1 in the world. It’s worth mentioning that just six months ago they were only 36^th. So what’s changed?

The final push, and the victory that brought them to the top of the world was winning the Dream Hack Open Fall 2020 and it wouldn’t be a true esports way if it wasn’t in a rather dramatic fashion. When everybody had already written them off, they’ve made a comeback and one for the books, for sure. Astralis beat them in the group stage, which landed them in the lower bracket of the tournament. But after they’ve secured three wins in a row, they’ve encountered their (and everybody else’s) biggest nemesis again, this time in the lower bracket final, where Astralis had landed after a loss to Vitality. Two final wins later, and Heroic literally made history. (It’s not like the last two matches weren’t dramatic, but you can read more about that in EspKings tournament overview here).

Departures That Left A Trace

Of course, that’s not nearly the whole story. It’s pretty interesting that Heroic finally reached number 1 in the world without one of their most famous and prominent players, Snappi. Marco Pffeifer aka Snappi was an on again off again team leader for several years accumulatively, but has just recently left the team once more. That has obviously changed the dynamic in the roster, which began their unstoppable rise in the late May of 2020, coinciding with Snappi’s departure to Tiger. A Few months before he left it was obvious Snappi didn’t have the very much needed faith in the team, saying in one of the interviews that they can’t take Astralis down from the throne just yet, but should instead “set the bar lower” for themselves. Him leaving eventually meant that Casper CadiaN Møller stepped up as a team captain which could’ve also easily been a missing puzzle that finally left players feeling free to play to the best of their ability.

One other important Heroic player, Patrick Hansen aka es3tag, left Heroic for Astralis a month after that, which was kind of the final straw in the already unstable period for Heroic, since his deal with Astralis also meant that FunPlus Phoenix, who had plans to acquire Heroic, decided to drop the agreement because of that.

In addition to that, suggesting undeniable under surface disturbance, Heroic themselves decided not to even mention both of those transfers on their site, while they are usually very keen on announcing every single arrival and departure to the team.

The Not So Terrible Turn Of Bad Events

Also, in mid-April Heroic changed coaches. Frederik Nielsen LOMME, who had been the head of the team from August 2019, handed his spot over to coach Nicolai Petersen also known as HUNDEN. But, he has been suspended since September, making this no. 1 world spot takeover even more interesting.

So how does all of this translate to becoming the world’s best CS:GO team? We can’t know for sure, but these are all huge clues and it’s obvious that some of these big changes, which didn’t look so good for Heroic when they started happening, ended up being the best thing that could’ve happened to them.

As far as the future goes, we’ll have to wait and see. In the meantime don’t forget to visit the rest of our blog to find out more valuable info you can then turn to winnings by trying out our Free2play games of your choice.