Perceived as the most entertaining team in the history of Counter-Strike, FaZe Clan was far from the favorites coming into the Major. Their poor form could have been attributed to a plethora of reasons, which would do injustice to isolate one player as the Achilles’ heel.
FaZe Clan made it to every single Major finals of CS2 before losing to MongolZ in the Quarter Finals in the first Major of 2025. While they came extremely close to winning it on both occasions, the roster was not supposed to make it to the finals in the first place. However, things should have been different for the Austin Major, but that went south in the most dramatic way. To understand what went wrong, looking back at the events leading up to the Major is important.
FaZe Clan’s downfall
Cracks began to show right from the start of CS2, as their all-star approach, which had seen them win every prestigious CS title during the CS:GO era, could not keep up with the new rising stars of CS2. FaZe, being FaZe, shocked everyone and reached both Major finals when they were not supposed to. Far from being in-form, FaZe Clan’s team of misfits managed to put up a show on the stage of both Majors but failed to get past the final hurdles.
Aftermath of Shanghai Major
Following a heartbreaking defeat against Spirit in the Shanghai Major Final, Robin ‘ropz’ Kool disagreed on how the roster should move forward, leading to him jumping ships to a Vitality roster that was primed for an elite lurker like the Estonian. Ropz was arguably the most important player for FaZe, and his departure left the roster in complete disarray.
ropz was replaced as North America’s last hope in EliGE. While questions could be raised about whether he would be the best fit for the team tactically, he certainly has the resume to join a super team. karrigan is known to make bands of misfits work, and everyone hoped for ELiGE to solve the role-overlapping issues that surfaced between frozeN and ropz, but that is still up for debate.
s1mple replaces broky
broky came into FaZe long ago during NiKo’s reign as IGL. He survived the dicey time of the roster and rose to stardom as an AWPer as karrigan returned to steer the ship after parting ways. karrigan, with trusty Harvard ‘Rain’ Nygaard by his side, assembled the perfect superteam that went on to win everything.
While broky dropped highlights after highlights, CS2 took away his flair, making him a liability for FaZe. From missing easy shots to making poor decisions, broky found himself in the crosshairs of the community. While he got blamed for the poor performances of FaZe, the problems were far deeper.
With a tournament left for the Austin Major, FaZe benched broky, replacing him in a blockbuster move was s1mple. FaZe convinced the CS:GO GOAT to come out of retirement to save the roster, and in typical FaZe fashion, they managed to replace a superstar with arguably the biggest name in Counter-Strike.
Preparation for the Austin Major
s1mple’s debut for FaZe was in IEM Dallas, and while they did not manage to win the event, s1mple’s performance was convincing enough to show that the Austin Major is something they can start dreaming about.
Karrigan has a history of pulling off surprises at big events, and while fans could not dare to but s1mple’s addition made them start to believe that Austin Major can yield something surprising. However, Rain’s absence meant that the full roster had less time to practice than they would have liked.
After getting in whatever practice they could, FaZe walked into Austin as a dark horse.
FaZe Clan in the Austin Major were:
- Finn “karrigan” Andersen – In-Game Leader (IGL)
- Håvard “rain” Nygaard – Entry Fragger
- David “frozen” Čerňanský – Rifler
- Jonathan “EliGE” Jablonowski – Rifler
- Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev – AWPer (on loan from NAVI)
FaZe Clan’s results at the BLAST.tv Austin Major 2025
Austin Major Stage 2
The opening day of the Austin Major saw FaZe cruise past Heroic and TYLOO, beating both teams with a dominant scoreline. As soon as fans started to believe in the FaZe Clan Austin dream, to everyone’s surprise, FaZe lost back-to-back with a 0-2 against 3DMAX and Legacy, leading to them needing one more win before making it to the next stage of the Major, which they secured after smashing MIBR out of the tournament with a 2-0 scoreline.
Austin Major Final Stage
Starting the final stage with a loss to Aurora, fans wrote it off as fatigue-driven, as the team had to play a few extra matches before making it to this stage, thus giving them less time to prepare.
FaZe faced MOUZ in the second match in the Final Stage, and they were bound to head out, given MOUZ was one of the best teams in 2025, securing many trophies before the Major. In the most unexpected outcome, FaZe outclassed MOUZ, thus reigniting the fire inside and hinting at the s1mple gamble paying off.
Following the head-turning win against MOUZ, FaZe made quick work of Legacy, having lost to them earlier in the tournament. Waiting for them in the groups was the MongolZ. Despite having pundits suggesting they are the second favorites, their bold style of CS made sure MongolZ stood little chance, winning the final match of the groups 2-0 and booking their spot in the QF.
Revenge of the MongolZ
From their recent performances, it was quite evident that it would take the likes of Spirit or Vitality to stop FaZe from winning the Major, as the road to the finals kept looking easier and easier with every passing match.
As fate would have it, MongolZ became the team to make it to the playoffs, and FaZe was the one waiting for them. Previous results would suggest that FaZe had little to do to reach the semi-finals, but that is when disaster struck.
MongolZ returned the favor to FaZe, not only did they manage to win both maps, they made the highly experienced FaZe side look like novices with nerves. To cap off their loss, s1mple missing easy shots became the highlight that FaZe would head out with, having stood tall against everyone up until the quarter-finals.
FaZe Clan always had a distinctly different approach to building their teams, and more often than not, it did not produce results for a prolonged period. The FaZe era came to an end with CS:GO, pointing to a roster that needed to be done. Rumors floated that ropz suggested adding firepower to the team as well as to rope in a new AWPer, which the organisation did not agree with, leading to him parting ways.
Given their recent results, it would be hard to argue against ropz, FaZe had to go for a new AWPer and is likely to add more firepower during the player break before IEM Cologne kicks off.
If not anyone, the whole debacle could be attributed to poor planning and a lack of foresight. The downfall did not start with broky delivering poor performances, but failing to replace Twistzz, losing a crucial piece like ropz, and failing to get the roster going as a team.
Many would argue that the experience of the old guard is not helping the cause. Karrigan and Rain have been massive liabilities in terms of firepower, even though the latter has stepped up on multiple occasions, showing he is still capable of hanging with top aimers. However, consistently good beats occasionally great, which suggests the roster should stop looking towards their peaks rather focus on grinding out consistently great performances if they are to challenge the likes of Vitality and Spirit.
It has been a month, and FaZe has not announced any roster moves with IEM Cologne creeping in. While everyone expected them to bring in fresh faces, that has not happened yet, and unless it’s something they have planned for, IEM Cologne will once again find s1mple in FaZe colors but with enough practice for FaZe to be able to produce something that is more convincing than their showing in Austin.
It is hard to imagine what direction the roster would go and if all a roster change is in the cards for them, and anything less than a win at Cologne would once again get the community calling for heads. Only time can tell if FaZe pulls a rabbit out of the hat in IEM Cologne, as not only that will infuse faith back into the fans, but starting the second half of the season with a prestigious trophy would put them back on the map.