Gambit Pull The Plug On Its Second Dota 2 Roster

Gambit Esports announced that the organization is seizing the operations for its second Dota 2 roster. The news surfaced on Monday, May 30, just a few weeks after Gambit disbanded its AS Monaco Gambit lineup.

Although not a shocking announcement, since it was rumored to happen before, Gambit decided to completely shut down its Dota 2 division by disbanding its Dota 2 team.

With that, Gambit no longer fields a Dota 2 team, having already parted ways with its main lineup, AS Monaco Gambit, at the start of the month.

With that, the lineup of Alexey “Smiling Knight” Sviridov, Maksym “mellojul” Pnev, Vasilii “AfterLife” Shishkin, Oleg “sayuw” Kalenbet, and Nikita “Pantomem” Balaganin are now free agents, free to join any organization they wish.

Besides cutting ties with the players, Gambit also parted ways with coach Timur “Ahilles” Kulmuhambetov and manager Alexander “StrangeR” Solomonov.

The squad’s departure from the Russian esports organization raises many questions, especially considering their success over the year.

Admittedly, Gambit Esports had a rough start to the year, finishing DPC EEU 2021/2022 Tour 1: Division II and they could only manage a ninth-12th at the Champions League Season 7. However, Gambit have improved since then.

They placed fourth in the eighth season of the Champions League and claimed back-to-back silver medals in the ninth and 10th seasons of the Dota 2 Champions League. Moreover, the team has been showing phenomenal form since the start of April.

Since the turn of April, AfertLife and co. have played 18 series and won all but four. Their only defeats came against Virtus.pro, BetBoom Esports, and twice against Brame.

So even though the squad got cut from the team, they likely won’t have a hard time finding another organization to pick them up. However, it has yet to be announced whether any team is interested in signing AfertLife and his crew.

In the announcement, which unveiled the departure of Gambit Esports Dota 2 roster, the organization also announced that the players would continue competing together under the One Move tag.

The now-former squad of Gambit was added to the organization in November, but after failing to qualify for The International, Gambit decided for a drastic change. As a result, the Russian organization moved the entire roster from AS Monaco Gambit to the “regular” Gambit Esports team that competed in the second DPC division.

Interestingly though, AfertLife and his crew outperformed the main Gambit’s roster by qualifying for the upper-division of EEU DPC. Meanwhile, in January, the AS Monaco Gambit dropped out of the upper-division with a sixth-place finish.

Now, as an independent stack. One Move will compete in EEU’s upper DPC division even though the team has parted ways with the organization.

“A new stage in the history of the team begins,” said team captain AfterLife.

“Our sincere thanks for the support from Gambit Esports, who believed in our team all along and made the team happen. We have done a lot of work since last October, and we don’t plan to quit halfway through. All of the players and coaching staff will continue to work together. A pool of team partners is being formed now, which we will announce as soon as everything is ready.”

By releasing its secondary roster, Gambit no longer fields a team in Dota 2. Moreover, with the departure of its Fortnite and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive lineup at the end of April, Gambit also no longer field a roster in the CS:GO scene.

Currently, Gambit field just two professional esports teams in Apeks and Valorant, whose future remains uncertain.