It is disconcerting to note the continuing struggles of the once might mTw; and now they are again in the spotlight---and not in a good way.

Aaron "AaroN" Hemmings and Anil "cly" Gulec were given their walking papers after slumping to 6th place in the EPS. These changes were made while the team competed in the first season of ESWC's Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. Now because of this, mTw has decided to drop out of the qualifiers altogether to focus in rebuilding the team.

mTw released this rather lengthy statement:

In the past few months, we have been welcomed by problem after problem which led to several disappointing results including our failure in the ESWC qualifier as well as our poor showing in the German EPS League. It was impossible for us to build up a perfect and stable lineup that we all desperately wanted to have and we feel that it is time to address some of these issues publicly and explain our actions.

Weber

When the team was first assembled with weber, rdl, steel, hudzg, nooky, there were already some underlying issues with Weber. Even dating back to ESWC from 2011 there were issues with his loyalty, his focus, and his intentions on the team. During the bootcamp and even important officials, he was constantly on facebook or steam chat with his girlfriend. When he wasn't preoccupied with his infatuated lust, he had a verbally abusive problem with at least one other player on the team at any given time. There was no going forwards with him and despite him being a talented player, there no productivity in efforts to improve as a team.

Going forwards, we had the choice between keeping wilzoo or weber. We chose weber thinking that he had more time to dedicate to the team. He chose to spend 10 days out of every month with his girlfriend where he couldn't be bothered to practice. He said "I can be on for officials but I can't be arsed to practice really". During the practices that we managed to get him to play, he constantly moaned about the other team being bad or the time spent wasn't productive. Additionally, there were interpersonal issues between him and another player on the team, and the majority vote thought it would be best to remove him.

Rdl

This is a case of giving the new player a chance and having it just not work out. We saw potential in rdl as a player who had the ability to be on the top of the scene but was just never had the team or support to break through.

While rdl had the time to put into the games, it was apparent during online events, practice, and our mixes at i46 and EPS, that he would not be what we had in mind in the timeframe that we were working with. His lack of experience in high-tier matches made it difficult for him to play against certain opponents and we felt that the only way to gain that experience was to live the experience himself. We weren't ready to have him learn at such pivotal events such as ESWC, Dreamhack, etc.

It was hard to see all the time that we put in mutually was just being thrown away, but we felt that it was the right move going forwards.

Face

We acquired face under the impression that he had the experience that rdl lacked but just needed some time to adjust to the game. We tried as much as possible to get face caught up to speed by showing him everything we know about the game such as smokes, flashes, positions, tricks, rotations, and the works. Hours of time spent in gathers, mixes, and practices trying to get face adjusted to the game from his 1.6 style, but no matter how much time we spent, the improvement from face was disproportionate.

Over the course of almost two months, he was still surprised how fast the enemy could be in his face. More to the point, near the end of his time on the team, it was apparent that he wasn't as motivated as the rest of the team. He only came on when it was time to practice. As soon as practice was over, he left teamspeak. He spent no time on the server to learn on his own. He did not get accustomed to the physics of the smokes or flashes despite frequent updates constantly changing the grenades.

mTw management was getting upset with his attitude as well since he spent no time trying to improve on his own but making demands for management to fulfill.

cLy

Partly a panic-pick-up, cLy was our fifth and final member to add alongside face. While we saw great potential out of this young player, he was a very emotional player. Despite knowing that he had bad internet and a bad PC, he let the situation control him in-game. He stopped communicating and played scared a lot during officials for this reason and then became enraged verbally.

We thought we were set on removing him and then he came to us and told us he thought it would be best for him to leave. Management knew that cLy had potential as a player and didn't want to see another flop so soon so they had a little chat together. After a talk with him, he was able to tone it down again for a little while, long enough to see that he substituted his verbal attitude with in-game attitude.

We saw no fix to the situation and therefore came to the decision to part ways with him.

Aaron

Just when we thought we could turn everything around with a keen young UK player, things turned around on us once again. Shortly after picking up Aaron, we were contacted by 4Kings informing us that Aaron was in a contract with them. Management spoke with Aaron and asked if what 4Kings was saying was true and if he was in a contract. Aaron intentionally left out information which was crucial for us to know. When 4Kings contacted us again, they not only made ridiculous demands for his release, but also made it apparent that they were acting immaturely, presumably out of spite.

Management wasn't happy that Aaron left out some crucial information and based off of this mistrust, was not going to put forth any money to buy Aaron out of the contract with 4Kings.

ESWC

Perhaps one of the most disappointing situation of all, we fell short during the ESWC qualifier by a hair. It seemed like from the very start that we were doomed to succeed in the qualifier. We registered for the qualifier when face was still on the team and the tournament was supposed to be played shortly after, but delays from the organisers seemed to play in our favour. We were able to make the necessary roster adjustments, but not before additional delays meant that we would have to play the final two rounds of the qualifier not only as a newly formed team, but without one of our starters (and strat caller).

We contacted the admins in charge of the ESWC qualifier to request that the date of the finals be moved by one or two days so that our fifth starter could be in attendance for the finals. nooky had vacation planned for a long time from the 9th - 16th. The entire qualifier was supposed to be done before he went on vacation. We were told that we should be accommodated for, but to wait for us to be in the finals.

Against all odds, we managed to make it to the finals only to be told that we could only have an extension of one day only if the other team agreed to move it. Naturally, the other team refused to move the game, and we were forced to play the default day and time of 20CET. With only one day of practice with a backup who hadn't played much CS:GO and two newly acquired players, we got one day of practice in on the rotation for the final round.

On the night of the finals, cLy found himself stuck in traffic in Berlin trying to get 120hz to work on his laptop that mtw sent him two days prior (so that he would stop complaining about low fps). Luckily he showed up at 19:56CET for a 20:00CET match. Without really apologising for being late, it was all demands and more delays from there. Having no practice beforehand, no warm-up, no notification as to when cLy would be online, and basically playing with a mix, we were able to take the finals into a third map where we were one round from winning in double overtime. The round fell apart and we found ourselves in a third overtime where the tension was so tight that you could cut it. A disappointing result for us indeed and yet another day feeling helpless and without control.

ESL

With these constant issues and subsequent changes brewing, we feel that it is best to drop out of this EPS Season. In our opinion, it makes no sense to rush another change or pressure ourselves to find a new pickup which we would have to do if we still want to compete this season. Instead we want to focus our efforts on finding the right additions. As a consequence, we will not have a roster capable of competing in the German EPS league until we find suitable players.

mTw is now down to:

• Andre "nooky" Utesch
• George "hudzG" Hoskins
• Joshua "steel" Nissan