maLeK to miss EPL group stage

31-3-2022 02:07

The coach has returned to France for medical treatment through the week.

After Evil Geniuses assistant coach Paolo "⁠EVY⁠" Berbudeau was spotted standing behind the team during their first ESL Pro League match against Astralis, it was announced by the North American organization that head coach Damien "⁠maLeK⁠" Marcel will miss the ESL Pro League group as the 36-year-old has returned to France to receive medical treatment not related to COVID-19.

maLeK will be back for the playoffs, should EG qualify

maLeK originally joined up with Evil Geniuses as part of their large team restructure at the start of 2022. The lineup, which brought together the core that played under Cloud9 during 2018, has had limited success in its time so far. The squad debuted with a last place finish at the BLAST Premier Spring Groups, but were still able to qualify for the Americas Regional Major Ranking tournament through the second open qualifier.

The Evil Geniuses organization is already under additional pressure to perform in this season of EPL as they placed last in both seasons 13 and 14 of the league. Per the Louvre Agreement signed by all ESL partner teams, the permanent spot of a team in Pro League will go up for review if the team places last in three out of four seasons. The North American side are already on the back foot after losing to Astralis on the first match day, and are set to take on Natus Vincere next.

Here is the Evil Geniuses lineup for the duration of the EPL group stage:

Vincent "⁠Brehze⁠" Cayonte
Tsvetelin "⁠CeRq⁠" Dimitrov
Jake "⁠Stewie2K⁠" Yip
Timothy "⁠autimatic⁠" Ta
William "⁠RUSH⁠" Wierzba

Paolo "⁠EVY⁠" Berbudeau (Coach)

2022-03-31 02:07

2 replies

Ez 0-5

2022-03-31 07:43

Get well malek men!!)))

2022-03-31 10:19

sad

2022-03-31 02:08

Sadge

rip group stage

The only reason I wanted this roster to win something was because of him, sadge.

1 reply

2022-04-01 01:28

At first I was like nah come on, G2 can't catch a break then I realized wait malek isn't on g2 anymore

2022-03-31 02:09

3 replies

2022-03-31 02:44

2022-03-31 05:30

g2 are already out too sadge

2022-03-31 10:26

rip

F, RIP EG chances

Unlucky Hopefully EG can still do some good

2022-03-31 02:10

2022-03-31 02:12

aw man

First adreN and now maLeK.. unlucky GL EG

2022-03-31 02:13

One of the worst coach in the scene, maybe EG could grab a win or two now.

2022-03-31 02:15

flag does not check out lol

2022-03-31 04:15

after today looks like he is going to miss playoff stage as well

2022-03-31 02:18

Didn’t the major winning roster of Cloud9 disband shortly after the win because they all hated each other or team simply didn’t work? Tell me if I’m wrong. So if I’m right, it wouldn’t be the smartest idea to bring this roster back together Right before the surprise major win they wanted to disband the team because of internal issues and then disbanded anyway despite the major win. So why bring this team back together?

2022-03-31 02:19

12 replies

They didn't leave out of hatred. They knew it was a fluke win so Stew and Tarik left for MIBR in order to stay relevant Ska was literally about to retire and RUSH was just kind of the guy who unwillingly saw it all apart Auti was just lazy to join a new team

2022-03-31 02:22

11 replies

So they brought back together a team that never really worked, a fluke as you say. Man this gets funnier by the minute. If they don’t produce some results, this will be the funniest team ever, I think at least stewie deserves better

2022-03-31 02:32

8 replies

Getting the original nip lineup in dig was funnier

2022-03-31 02:43

All comes back to ska phoning it in and C9 green lighting it. If C9 was more ruthless with roster moves like Liquid, stew might still be on C9 and C9 would've won more majors/done the grand slam instead of Liquid. Some of the Liquid players would've probably joined C9 at some point.

no way C9 would win a major again or be as succesful as Liquid, at most they'd be like EG/NRG in 2019/2020

2022-03-31 16:37

Not if they had some of the Liquid players. Heck, if C9 got a great awper at some point to replace ska, they probably would've been pretty good. Maybe not Liquid in 2019 good but better than Liquid in 2018.

2022-03-31 23:25

Its funny in premise but funnier when you look at the stats and see that the old c9 players actually look good (relatively) and its the old eg guys (like cerq) who are really underwhelming

Yea they need to step up

2022-03-31 15:48

Rush wasn't the first choice. Valde was. And apparently the only reason he didn't join was because OG didn't want to lower his buyout. So this wouldn't even have been a discussion if valde had joined since it would've been only stew + auti from C9.

2022-03-31 23:26

Interesting, well the team is improving it’s not that bad

2022-03-31 23:31

They didn't hate each other but there was internal strife over how the game should be played and people left. Not a fluke lol. Also, this is only missing Tarik and Skadoodle and I don't know who was the issue before but maybe one of them. This is EG, not C9.

2022-03-31 07:12

roster would've still done better as long as shroud wasnt in it

2022-03-31 14:54

Doublepost

NOT related to COVID... ok?

2022-03-31 02:27

MY NAME IS MALEK :'(

2022-03-31 02:37

wtf u doing? go coach and stop being lazy

2022-03-31 05:27

MANAMEISMALEEEEK );

2022-04-01 15:33

"Malek will be back for the playoffs, should EG qualify" He can stay in France little bit longer, this scenario wont happen anyways

2022-03-31 02:40

With or without him EG sucks big

2022-03-31 02:59

MY NAME IS MALEK

2022-03-31 03:13

Oof

2022-03-31 03:33

Sad

2022-03-31 03:43

yoooo hope is nothing serious, would rather hear it was covid

2022-03-31 04:13

He ain’t missin much

2022-03-31 04:25

fuck, EG is doomed now because of this :X

2022-03-31 04:30

what if malek is about to get banned for the new coach bug and didnt want to embarrass himself on stage

2022-03-31 05:14

I think you're onto something here, especially cause the reason given is super vague

2022-04-01 14:50

idk why but i just got this feeling man

2022-04-01 17:20

This EG lineup looked bad from the start and whoever thought this roster would’ve been a good idea is even more clueless than your Average hltv ‚I Fix teams’ thread creator. They got bigger problems than a missing Coach.

2022-03-31 05:20

i thought the team was just a joke for 3 boston winners to have fun and play with washed brehze and cerq, not really trying to win anything. After major somethings gonna move i think

2022-03-31 06:26