Vitality’s apEX on why CIS is the “best region” in CSGO

Team Vitality’s Dan ‘apEX’ Madesclaire has been really impressed with the CIS teams and the level of grit in its performances has made it one of “best regions” in CSGO.

ApEX has been in CS since 2009, and has seen regions rise and fall throughout his career. As the effects of the online era are still being felt across CSGO, the CIS region has become a hopeful talking point about the future of the game.

But it could be one of those CIS teams that deny the Frenchmen a chance at the $425,000 main event as Team Vitality head into the BLAST Premier: Spring Showdown.

“We are in a moment where the best teams are really young or that just made a change,” apEX told Dexerto. These young teams have been keeping legacy orgs on their toes, and it’s been the “CIS-style” that’s been gradually netting great results.

CIS is CSGO’s best region

The rise of CIS isn’t surprising for pros like apEX. They’ve been playing with these players for years, with recurring names making themselves known.

As the CSGO scene, overall, is experiencing a huge shift of teams and participants, it’s the time to strike for these teams.

“When you’ve been so successful for so long, you don’t surprise anyone,” apEX said of Natus Vincere (Na’Vi), but was instead impressed by the teams rising up.

“Gambit they are the team that surprised me the most,” he explained to Dexerto. “I mean we’ve been playing with them in practice a bit before their rising up and to be honest they played really solid Counter-Strike – with their CIS-style but it’s really good.”

BLAST Premier: Spring Showdown 2021 CIS participants like Gambit and Team Spirit come from a region that has healthy pool of players to choose from when facilitating a roster.

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“Obviously CIS region has been rising in the past in terms of number of players,” he said. “So they have a big pool of players playing CS. I feel like half of [FACEIT] players are Russians or Ukranians, Russian-speaking, and yeah when you have a bunch of players like that, you can pick the best ones.”

If Vitality wants to qualify for the BLAST Spring Finals, then they could be on a collision course with Gambit in their bracket.

With superstar Mathieu ‘ZywOo’ Herbaut among Vitality’s ranks, apEX likes his team’s chances against these orgs but know they’re going to have to work to keep up with the players rising up.

“That’s what I like about the CIS region, their people are grinding and grinding,” he continued. “It’s a chance to be here in the pro scene, and they’re grinding as much as possible. And that’s what I like to see from them.”

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He hopes that LANs change the narrative once they come back and reverses Vitality’s fortunes along with it.

Until then, apEX and his team are looking forward to the BLAST Spring Showdown where they’re going to be tested by some of the world’s best, including those from the CIS region.

Dexerto’s Matt Porter contributed to this report.