Cover-Credits:
Following his championship win at The International 2022 (TI11), Kurtis "Aui_2000" Ling became the first person to win The International both as a player and coach. Aui_2000 managed to win the illustrious championship as a player for Evil Geniuses back at The International 2015 (TI5) and as a coach for Tundra Esports at TI11.
The championship winners are understandably taking a break after a hectic competitive season, but that has not stopped the Canadian coach from writing a blog covering his journey as a coach with Tundra Esports along with the behind the scenes.
Aui_2000 stated that it did not feel right winning TI5 as a player
In a recent blog, Aui_2000 talked about his journey as a coach throughout the year as well as the rumors behind the removal of Adrian "Fata" Trinks from the roster during the middle of the season. He started off the blog by addressing the rumors behind Fata’s removal from the team.
“One thing I want to address is the Fata kick that occurred earlier in the year. Roster changes are hard. The players and I decided to not talk about the direct reasons for the kick publicly because that kind of discussion tends to become extremely toxic/negative. However, I do want to clear up some misconceptions. Fata did not save Sney’s [Sneyking] slot on the roster only for Sney to turn around and kick him. Even now Sney doesn’t want to say anything, because he says it’ll make Fata feel bad if we address it, but I’m sick of the comments about Sney betraying Fata to save himself because they aren’t true.``
The Canadian coach further went on to say that the decision was made mainly by the players, as he was only recently recruited by the organization as its head coach at the time. He also said that the decision was unanimously agreed upon by other players within the team.
“What happened was that two players approached me and stated their concerns regarding Fata. At that point in time, I was relatively new to the team as their coach and the players had been together much longer, so I told them that I would support the decision if all the other teammates agreed. The four team mates then talked and came to a unanimous decision. Saksa was then confirmed to be available and willing to join, so we brought the desire to change the roster to the org, which, while unhappy, chose to support the team’s decision.”
He then talked about the difference between winning TI5 as a player & winning TI11 as a coach, saying that it didn’t feel like he won TI5 in the right way.
“At TI5 it felt like I didn’t win the right way. Maybe it was because I got kicked after lul. I don’t mean this as an insult to the team and I enjoyed watching Sumail 1x9, but we didn’t build a dota team together – it was more like a business oriented group of really high skilled players.”
As of now, Aui_2000 will be looking to spend the off-season by livestreaming his games while also making a draft analysis of Tundra’s matches during the Grand Finals on the organization’s Youtube channel.
