On August 13, 2021, Ivan “F_1N” Kochugov returned to the role of Gambit head coach. In September 2020, Ivan received a nine-month ban for exploiting the camera bug. The CS.MONEY Blog is going to reminisce on Gambit’s achievements with F_1N at the helm, with F_1N as an analyst, and try to predict how his comeback will affect the team’s results in the nearest future.
Before Gambit
F_1N is a former Counter-Strike 1.6 professional player, best known for his playing career in Virtus.pro and forZe. After the release of CS:GO, he decided to distance himself from esports.
In 2017, Kochugov became the coach of the Ukrainian team Art of Cybergame, which was later signed by pro100, Danylo “Zeus” Teslenko’s organization. F_1N acted as pro100’s coach for five months and then resumed his career as a player.
At the time, F_1N started to play for the second forZe lineup, forZe.FY, but abandoned the idea quickly and went off the esports grid for two years.
Reunion with groove
In 2018 and 2019, Gambit barely accomplished anything at all. Reshuffles and infusions of “young blood” didn’t help, so the main roster became inactive, with an academy created instead.
Perhaps under the influence of groove, F_1N’s former teammate in Virtus.pro, forZe, and UNiTED, Gambit brought in Kochugov to find young players for their roster. F_1N received an invite to the CIS League at FACEIT and spent four months searching for potential candidates.
When the roster was finally formed, Kochugov became the coach of Gambit Youngsters, a large and ambitious project. Top organizations in CIS and other regions had already tried to establish academies before, but they never achieved the results that Youngsters would accomplish later.
First victories
“If you have the energy to have fun, it means you didn’t practice well enough”,— Ivan made his point in one of his first interviews as a Gambit Youngsters coach. Apparently, Gambit have been sticking to this principle to this day: players rarely stream and don’t play FPL.
“Youngsters” achieved their results quite swiftly. In April 2019, the team participated, under Kochugov’s leadership, in the Copenhagen Games, one of the most famous tier-2 tournaments.
Due to visa-related problems, Gambit’s Daniil “porya” Poryadin was unable to attend the event. He was replaced by Sergey “Ax1Le” Rykhtorov from the inactive roster of the main team. He was the only one in the Youngster squad who’d previously faced strong opponents. Subsequently, Ax1Le became a regular member of the team.
A total of 62 teams qualified for Copenhagen Games 2019. At the main event, Gambit Youngsters defeated GODSENT led by a three-time Major champion Markus “pronax” Wallsten. The squad ended up placing 7–8th. But that was just the beginning.
In September 2019, Gambit Youngsters flew to New York City to compete at the MSI Gaming Arena and won the event. It was the same arena that hosted ESL One New York 2019 earlier that year. Back then, the team, including F_1N, watched the games from the auditorium. Surely, at that moment, players dreamed of ending up on a stage like that one day. And F_1N was thinking about how to help them make that dream come true.
Pandemic
RMR
Gambit Youngsters finished 2019 with a trip to the DreamHack Open Sevilla 2019, where they got 7–8th place. The team’s results got somewhat weaker at the beginning of 2020, but the Youngsters managed to participate in two RMR tournaments.
At the WePlay! Clutch Island, Gambit Youngsters made the accomplishment that’s on every CIS club’s checklist — they defeated Natus Vincere.
In the middle of summer, many teams go on vacation. But Gambit Youngsters decided to continue practicing and play in smaller tournaments. This strategy paid off: at the beginning of August, the Youngsters won four tournaments in a row.
HObbit
At about the same period, Abay “HObbit” Khassenov joined the team. He replaced Anton “supra” Tšernobai, who lived in Estonia and couldn’t make it to the boot camp. For F_1N, HObbit’s arrival meant two changes were in order: restructuring the play, since Abay assumed the role of captain, and finding an approach to HObbit, as Ivan hadn’t worked with players of that high caliber as a coach before. Apparently, there were no problems with the latter. And HObbit was captain for only two weeks. The team quickly realized that Vladislav “nafany” Gorshkov was an excellent in-game leader.
The ban
The management’s decision to create an academy was an attempt to build a competitive roster from scratch and regain its leading position in CS:GO. Gambit were slowly yet steadily moving towards their goal when suddenly the coaching bug problem came to light. Few did NOT resort to using this bug — 37 coaches got banned as a result, including F_1N.
The duration of the ban depended on the severity of the violation. F_1N used the bug in six games, for which he was suspended for nine months. This investigation was handled by ESIC (The Esports Integrity Commission). Valve took action as well, punishing the coaches. Unfortunately, Ivan was permanently banned from the Majors.
Gambit decided that F_1N would stay in the organization as an analyst, while groove would temporarily take over as coach. Konstantin’s name is associated with all Gambit’s great accomplishments.
Coach Groove: the golden era
By October 2020, Gambit Youngsters had been in HLTV’s top 30 for 12 weeks. After that, the organization decided to make the Youngsters the club’s main roster, leaving out the “Youngsters” part from their name.
With groove coaching, Gambit’s performance skyrocketed. The team won DreamHack Open November 2019 and took 5–8th place at DreamHack Masters Winter 2020 Europe, a tournament that gathered many squads from the top 10. Even though Gambit lost to Astralis in the quarterfinals, their performance was truly impressive.
Thanks to their achievements, Gambit got an invitation to IEM Katowice Play-in 2021. Gambit made it to the main stage, but they obviously weren’t favorites at a tournament this large.
In the course of the event, Gambit were defeating the world’s leading teams, enrapturing the whole community. When Gambit reached the final, it was hard to believe they’d actually done it. The team that had played at endless tier-3 championships just a year ago suddenly reached the finals of one of the most elite tournaments in CS:GO — nothing short of fantastic.
Gambit’s win at IEM Katowice 2021 marked the beginning of their glorious era. This was followed by victories at EPIC League CIS 2021, IEM Summer 2021, and BLAST Premier: Spring Final 2021. Gambit then reached the finals of major tournaments three more times.
The final tournament of the season was IEM Cologne 2021, held in the LAN format. Many were skeptical towards Gambit’s results online and believed only a LAN victory could confirm and consolidate their status.
No triumph happened. In Cologne, Gambit made it to the playoffs but dropped in the quarterfinals. Still, it was more than a decent result for their first LAN.
F_1N’s return
On August 13, F_1N returned as Gambit’s coach. Groove will continue to help the team but will devote much less time to it. According to nafany, this is a pre-planned decision:
“Ivan’s ban finally expired, and, just as we’d expected, he’s back in his role.
I think groove will still help us a little, make some adjustments, but, generally, he’s done working with us as a coach.”
As of right now, it’s with groove as their coach that Gambit have achieved their biggest results. However, it’s important to keep in mind that F_1N and groove worked in tandem as analyst and coach, respectively. Their vision of the game might well be similar. So the Gambit players shouldn’t have any problems due to this reshuffle.
In the eyes of the community, F_1N may look like an unreliable option, but let’s not forget that he was the one who laid the foundations for Gambit’s future victories. And he contributed greatly to those victories.
In theory, everything looks great. But we’ll see what impact F_1N’s return as Gambit coach will have in reality. In particular, how Gambit will cope without their coach at Majors. CS.MONEY will be following the progress of this team as well as others. Stay tuned for the most important esports news.
Do you like getting CS:GO news in our vibe?
What are you waiting for? Hit subscribe!
