New plans for Na`Vi: Dota 2 roster is down until August

Natus Vincere CEO Yevhen “HarisPilton” Zolotarov gave a long talk about the Dota 2 roster after their weakest season, as well as their future plans.

About replacing LeBron

The season is off to a good start, and we have what I consider a worthy squad. […] Everything is fine, we have clear leadership, good coordination, leading to positive results. […] Nothing created any difficulties, I was looking forward to a bright future.

The replacement of Lebron was not because he was unfit or a weak player. Although his microphone ability has many flaws, he is a person who lives for the team, in the game and outside the game. Dendi mentioned about him in Tweetlong, that Dendi would not agree to a replacement. That’s right, Dendi was the only one who opposed the decision. I make decisions based on the majority, because people see that the problem lies in this player. No one sees the problem in themselves, in their attitude, in laziness. There was an offer to replace him before EPICENTER XL, but I don’t want to change anything until the tournament is over. I believe that if Newbee had been more in our favor, particularly in the late game, we might not have changed at all. I’m sure the team could have performed better in the TI8 qualifiers.[…]

It is foolish to deny responsibility from everyone: the players, coaches, managers and analysts. But the final decision is mine, so the responsibility for failure is also mine.

About future plans

With last year and the last two years, there are only two options. The first choice is the way Sneg1 (CEO of Virtus.pro) created Virtus.pro: let a strong captain and leader make decisions about the players he wants to play with. […] Option two is the complete opposite: a team without strong leadership, but with clearly divided responsibilities (like FlyToMoon/Winstrike). […]

About the fate of the current lineup

We decided to shut down the entire squad until August, including the coaches, analysts and managers. Some people think we want to do the “New Era” game to announce the old faces two months later. That is not the goal. If we choose a good leader, then several people on the team might fit into this plan. […] If we decide to create a roster of separate players with clear responsibilities, there’s a chance that some of them could stay. It is difficult to know which players are likely to stay, but I will share my thoughts. The chances of more than one player being retained on the roster are very low, because the organization wants to start from scratch. […]

Natus Vincere failed to qualify for The International 2018 in both open qualifiers. This is considered the worst performance in the team’s Dota 2 history. With what’s going on this season, the community is hoping for big changes to happen.