Following a string of disappointing results and the swap of Jim "zneel" Andersson for longtime member Kristoffer "Tentpole" Nordlund, SK Gaming has announced another roster change with the removal of Marcus "zet" Sundström and zneel.

This confirmed a change foreshadowed in an interview with Andreas "bds" Thorstensson which stated that zet was on the outs for missing his flight to Gamescom a month ago.

With Extreme Masters Season 4 Global Challenge Chengdu just around the corner SK will need to secure two players quickly if they still wish to compete.
 

SK Gaming
Jimmy "allen" Allén Dennis "walle" Wallenberg Robert "RobbaN" Dahlström

We at GotFrag were recently contacted by Blight Gaming Manager and Owner blackfoger, who had the following to say:

"We will be releasing our USA team due to the fact they have been unable to maintain a starting five as well as due to their lack of practice. Additionally, Dustin "dizzaman" Dilyerd would have been unable to attend WCG USA due to school."

With this news Blight Gaming is without a US based CS team, however they still maintain a Canadian team which recently won WCG Canada and participates actively online in CEVO Professional and ESEA Invite.

When asked if the team intended to pick up another US based team blackfoger said the organization hoped to acquire a new US team within the month.

Despite a lack of many international teams, Evil Geniuses pulls out a satisfying win over Korean giants WeMadeFOX in a best of three series winning 2-1.

The tournament started strong for EG as they were able to defeat local teams 2-0 early on and continue their momentum by taking Turmoil 2-0 in straight overtime maps 19-17. Feeding off that win the team continued forward beating WMF 16-4 and 16-5 in the Upper Bracket finals securing them a spot at the Grand Finals on Saturday.

Coming from the lower bracket after defeating Turmoil in straight maps on de_inferno and de_dust2, the Koreans were looking for payback against EG, unfortunately for them the first map would be EG's choice of de_train. EG went up early with a strong T side and closed the map out 16-10. The next map was WMF's choice of de_inferno where they came out with a strong 11-4 first half. EG however was able to throw up a strong second half performance and brought the score up to 15-14 before WMF was able to narrowly secure a win.

The final map was de_nuke where EG came out hot securing 9 rounds on t side. After winning the second pistol, WMF was back in the match tying it up 9-9. WMF continued with their momentum winning the next two rounds bringing the score to 11-9 in there favor. At this point EG was able to turn it around with strong inner holds and ended up winning the map 16-13 sealing their first place finish at the tournament.

GameGune kicked off with a blazing start yesterday in Mexico City, Mexico. The tournament has moved into a 8 man tournament with two American powerhouses going for the first place prize. These two teams, EG and Turmoil, will meet tomorrow in the Upper Bracket. Some predictions for this event expected this match to be the finals match of this event. As that is not out of the question, these teams are meeting rather early in this tournament.

EG has proven strong over summer heading into this big event. They recently won the last season of ESEA in a great matchup against complexity. They have been a team that has constantly been at the top and has dominated this past season of CEVO. They are currently 16-1 as the season is ending and heading into the playoffs. They are also undefeated as the next season of ESEA is just now kicking off. Their only close matches have been against Turmoil and CyberRev. They have proven to be the online powerhouse and bringing that skill to LAN with them.

Turmoil is a team that has been in the news quite a bit lately. They are the former Gravitas Gaming, an organization they were with for over a year. They had ventured into the top of the American CS scene during the CGS days and have remained a top three competitor ever since.

September 10th marks the beginning of the eighth edition of multi-national game tournament GameGune. This time around we will be seeing a small change in pace as the event will be held this side of the Atlantic, in Mexico City, Mexico. The La Aldea Digital Party will be attracting a lot of local talent as well as a hand full of big name teams such as WemadeFox, EG, SK Ladies, and Turmoil.

The tournament will be held over three days, and will run a double-elimination best-of-three format to ensure everyone gets their fair shot at winning €18,000. The upper bracket kicks off at 12PM EDT so be sure to keep your browsers locked to GotFrag for updates, scores, HLTV, and more.

With WCG.USA just around the corner, teams with international players are starting to finalize their rosters. Blight is one of the newest teams to do so.

The team has also released Jon "mediaN" Gundy effective immediately. Dustin "dizzathrilla" Dilyerd had this to say about letting Jon go: "We let median go because he just did not fit in well with our team and playing style. He is a great player and we wish him the best in the future."

For WCG.USA the team will be using Kevin "aZn" Wang and Fadil "Nepo" Canovic as ringers. David "Xp3" Garrido will not be eligible to play because he is from France. The team will be using their normal lineup in ESEA/CEVO/Extreme Masters.

The team does not know yet who will replace Jon, but will have to make a decision sooner than later for the upcoming tournaments.
 

Blight CS WCG Lineup
Dustin "dizzaman" Dilyerd Chris "truls" Navratil Dan "mehLer" Mehler Kevin "aZn" Wang Fadil "Nepo" Canovic

Blight CS Roster
Dustin "dizzaman" Dilyerd Chris "truls" Navratil Dan "mehLer" Mehler David "Xp3" Garrido TBA

It was recently reported that the Gravitas Gaming organization had closed its doors. This left their Counter-Strike squad without any sort of backing for the upcoming GameGune and WCG events.

"We were definitely surprised about Gravitas folding, it kinda came out of left field and the timing was especially terrible with both GameGune in Mexico and WCG in New York coming up," team captain Ediz "goodfornothing" Basol told GotFrag.com.

In need of some help to attend these events the team quickly turned to their old manager, Mike "Bruin" Fujimura, owner of Team Turmoil.

"It was so important for us to find someone that could send us to those events," Basol continued. "I went to Bruin for some help and then he came up with the idea that we should go as Turmoil to these two events."

The team will be competing under the Turmoil tag at GameGune Mexico this weekend, with Matt "PaTyoJoN" Iantosca subbing in for Joe "perez" Perez due to a scheduling conflict with his work. Following that event, they will be competing at the WCG USA Qualifiers in New York where they are a serious contender to take one of the two trips to China.

Turmoil

Ediz "goodfornothing" Basol
Thomas "thoMz" Garcia
Derrick "impulsive" Truong
Ben "benz0" Hui
Joe "perez" Perez

Team Excello has announced today that they have picked up j1n to be their North American Counter-Strike team. Excello currently has a Counter-Strike 1.6 team in Finland, the former Astralis.

The team has started off ESEA, CEVO, and ESL on the right foot this time around. They are currently undefeated with a 7-0 record in ESL-Invite.

In addition to the organization change, the team has also made a key roster change. They have removed Don "b33f" Frain and brought in well known player David "savi0r" Park. David is of the former x3o/coL roster and had stepped down for personal reasons. This marks his official return to a team in the top of 1.6 in America.

GotFrag had the chance to talk to Excello's North American Manager, Ian "FuzzyHat" Olson, about the roster pickup: "We are happy to once again be back in North American eSports. With the start of ESL-America and ESEA League, North American eSports has been on the rise in this time of economical drought. I'm happy to have found a team that has the passion and will to do what it takes to make it to the top. With the addition of j1n to the Excello brand, we will be defining excellence in North America and all over the globe."

Excello NA 1.6
CJ "cJ_B" Banarsee
Christopher "projeckt" Costoso
David "savi0r" Park
Demir "wrd" Decevic
Alex "hazard" Martins