ptkovsky
Easily one of the best AWPers in the history of competitive Counter-Strike, the 26-year-old Sweden’s Jesper Wecksell, who is better known in the esports community as JW, recently announced through his social network account’s post that his contract with the Fnatic multigaming esports organization has ended, and that he now officially decided to leave the Fnatic roster and became free agent.
In his recent TwitLonger message, JW was thankful to one of the best Swedish CS: GO teams he was part of, and especially warmly remembered playing with his friends from one of the first iterations of the Fnatic CS: GO squad.
In his post in the popular online service designed for longer tweets, Wecksell also stated that he will continue actively practicing and is looking forward to any of the future opportunities to come.
The recent news about JW leaving Fnatic team came in right in conjunction with the Swedish esports organization’s recent announcement in their official Twitter account, where the FNC team confirmed their recent roster update, featuring smooya over Jackinho on the sniper role.
We previously covered some of the details on the disturbing situation regarding the recent roster changes in Fnatic, which were obviously done by the team’s management because of the lackluster performances of the former iteration of the Fnatic CS: GO team.
CS:GO Roster Update: We're excited to welcome back @smooyacs to our AWP position for a 3 month trial with extension rights.
We'd like to once again thank @Movistar_Riders for allowing this to happen. Welcome to the Black and Orange family, Owen! pic.twitter.com/mk1eENC5Rp
— FNATIC (@FNATIC) October 15, 2021
Speaking of JW’s legacy, Jesper Wecksell represented the Fnatic organization for almost eight straight years in a row, since he first joined the likes of one the best CS: GO teams in August 2013, and all the way up until Wecksell was benched and therefore became inactive in June 2021. But there was also a small exception in JW’s stable appearances on the competitive CS: GO scene in the Fnatic shirt.
The exception occurred when the Fnatc’s star trio of the players suddenly decided to transfer their contracts to the another Swedish GODSENT organization and try and play under the tag of the newly formed Swedish superteam.
Thus, Wecksell and the other two star players in the Fnatic roster, such as Robin “flusha” Ronnquist and Freddy “KRIMZ” Johansson, used to compete for the GODSENT CS: GO team during the period of time since August 2016 and all the way up until the start of 2017 year in February.
The legendary Swedish professional CS: GO player, JW switched from CS 1.6 to CS: GO in 2012 like many other Counter-Strike progamers had to do back in the day, due to the lack of the official tournaments being held in the older CS 1.6 version of the game.
Besides the likes of Fnatic team, Wecksell also used to compete for multiple prominent esports organizations, such as Swedish teams gosu.se and WRTT, Belgium‘s Epsilon eSports from the EU region, also SY_b team, and formerly Swedish and now Brazilian GODSENT team.
During the era of Fnatic’s brilliance on the competitive CS: GO scene, JW was widely considered as one of the best CS: GO players and best snipers in the world.
Wecksell managed to compete on par or even stand higher in terms of the individual rankings than the other strong contenders, such as France‘s Kenny “kennyS” Schrub, who at the time represented organizations such as Team EnVyUs and later G2 Esports.
As an elite progamer, Jesper Wecksell managed to win about $1,000,000 of total prize money on the competitive CS: GO scene during his professional esports career.
Sometimes nicknamed in the competitive FPS’ community as Wonderchild for his unique style of play and smart AWP rifle usage, JW is also famous for finishing first at the three Major CS: GO tournaments, which was a unique achievement in the CS: GO scene itself.
The Fnatic’s epic achievement was holding all the way up until the point when Denmark‘s best CS: GO team Astralis managed to surpass the legendary Swedish FNC roster’s record in the Summer of 2019.
As a star player, JW won many CS: GO championships with Fnatic. Remember, that he actually stated in his post that there were 25 of them in total, which is totally amazing.
But let us actually briefly remember and focus a bit more on the Fnatic’s road during the three major CS: GO championships, which were won by the almost unstoppable Swedish roster featuring JW back in the period of 2013-2015.
DreamHack Winter 2013
The Swedish Fnatic roster were triumphant at the three major CS: GO events, starting from the DreamHack Winter 2013 championship. The historical LAN tournament in Jonkoping, Sweden featured 16 teams fighting for the overall prize pool of $250,000.
The DreamHack series championship was then considered as the major CS: GO tournament by Valve. Fnatic team started with a strong statement, after flawlessly breezing through their respective group A of the Swedish event.
The Fnatic squad won both of their two opening matches, first one against the likes of the Na’Vi squad, featuring CIS members formerly from other Ukrainian and Russian CS: GO teams, and also the following game against France’s Clan-Mystik team.
In the playoffs of the DreamHack Winter 2013 event, Fnatic were able to overcome the Frenchmen from Recursive eSports, and also win against North America‘s roster of Complexity Gaming in the semifinals stage of the DreamHack tournament.
In the final match of the Swedish championship, the Fnatic superteam, coached by one of the best CS 1.6 players and in-game leaders Patrik “cArn” Sattermon, were able to win the final Bo3 match with the 2:1 score against the opposing Ninjas in Pyjamas roster.
ESL One: Katowice 2015
Fnatic finished first at the major ESL One: Katowice 2015 championship in Poland. The ESL One series event in Katowice was the second Major won by the Fnatic legends. The Swedish team was able to once again beat their rival NiP team in the finals of the ESL event, which was held in March 2015.
The epic Fnatic vs Ninjas in Pyjamas final match of the tournament finished with the 2:1 score in favor of the British-Swedish multigaming esports organization. Fnatic team confidently won group A of the event, with victories over Australia‘s Vox Eminor team and also the Natus Vincere squad. The Fnatic vs Natus Vincere Bo1 group clash ended with the 16:7 score on Cobblestone in favor of the Swedes.
In the playoffs of the ESL’s Katowice championship, Fnatic easily overcame German CS: GO team titled PENTA Sports in the first round, and were also victorious against the likes of Russia’s fan favorites Virtus.pro, with the first map finishing 19:17 during the overtime.
In the finals of the Katowice event in 2015, Fnatic were once again able to beat 2:1 their Swedish rivals — the Ninjas in Pyjamas squad, featuring Counter-Strike legends such as Patrik “f0rest” Lindberg and Christopher “GeT_RiGhT” Alesund. Thousands of esports fans and more casual viewers on the Spodek Arena witnessed the Fnatic roster winning the cup, taking home $100,000 in prize money.
ESL One: Cologne 2015
The JW’s Fnatic roster continued their domination on the next ESL One series event in Cologne later that year — the ESL One: Cologne 2015 championship. As the top 8 team during the last Major, Fnatic were able to obtain the Legends status on the German ESL event, which was played in August 2015.
Fnatic squad first confidently beat Polish CS:GO Team eBettle in their first match with the 16:2 score on Mirage, and then were able to continue their victorious path by smashing their next opponents — the formidable Na’Vi team, with the 16:2 score on Inferno map.
After qualifying for the playoffs, in the first knockout matchup Fnatic faced Brazil’s then rising stars — Luminosity squad, featuring one of the best players in the history of the competitive Counter-Strike, such as Gabriel “FalleN” Toledo and Marcelo “coldzera” David.
The Swedish giants won the Bo3 series 2:0, with the second Mirage map finishing with the close 16:14 score. In the semifinals, Fnatic were able to beat Virtus.pro, with the series finishing 2:1 in favor of the Swedish CS: GO team.
Fnatic then faced Team EnVyUs in the grand finals of the ESL Cologne 2015 event. After winning the first Dust2 map with the 19:15 score during the overtime, JW’s team then won the Bo3 series and the entire event itself after finishing the match with the 2:0 score in their favor.
In the end, all in all, after failing the 2014 competitive season, the final epic win in Katowice 2015 marked the Fnatic’s third major CS: GO tournament win.
The Fnatic CS: GO team’s record of three major tournament wins was only beaten by the mighty Astralis squad, when they won their own fourth CS: GO major title at the StarLadder Berlin Major 2019 — the second Valve-sponsored event of 2019, which Fnatic team could not attend, and the major $1,000,000 offline tournament with 24 teams participating, which was held in August-September of 2019.
The FNC team will also miss the upcoming PGL Major Stockholm 2021 event due to the lack of the needed RMR points, and their 0-5 record and the following last place finish in group D of the IEM Fall 2021 championship in Europe.