The King is Back! Device returns to Astralis

After nearly a year of absence from professional CS:GO, the legendary AWPer is ready to play. Device returns to Astralis with the hopes of rejuvinating the legendary organization. With just Elisa Masters Espoo left on their calendar, the team will have enough preparation time to ramp into 2023.

Device was one of the founding members of Astralis. The organization which was once marketed as a player-owned org began its journey in 2016 with the signing of the former TSM/TQM roster. The team that was known for choking in big games later went on to become the most dominant squad to ever exist. That dominance was built around Device's AWP prowess. His style of play while not as eye-catching as s1mple's, was consistently brilliant.

Modern AWPers do many things by the book when it comes to playing to the percentages. Device was the player that wrote that book in CS:GO. And that playstyle netted him and Astralis 4 Majors and 19 Big Titles in the 5 years he was with the org.

Despite nearly half a decade of immense success, Device's departure from Astralis was unceremonious, to say the least. With the team's contracts coming up at the end of the year, it was expected that the roster will either resign with Astralis or move to another organization as a complete roster. But Device's transfer to NIP in early 2021 threw a spanner into the works. His reported $600,000 buyout was a clear letter of intent from NIP.

And Device at the time had completely bought into the "NIP System". When the vlog of his first day at Ninjas HQ came out, fans were shocked by his comments on Astralis. With comments such as NIP being "5 steps ahead" of Astralis and Astralis being "lucky with timings and the way they read the meta". With how Device is being treated as the prodigal son returning home, it seems as though the CS scene has experienced collective amnesia.

As expected, Farlig is the player making way for the legend to come back to the roster. The young AWPer has consistently been under pressure due to the community comparing him to Device. While a promising youngster on FPX, Farlig failed to meet expectations on Astralis and wasn't performing to a tier 1 level.

Will Device be able to save Astralis? As highlighted in our recent piece on the topic, Astralis have deeper issues than just the AWP position, issues that will need further roster changes especially in light of k0nfig's departure.

Astralis' Roster now is -

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