Cover-Credits:
Nigma Galaxy (formerly Team Nigma) will continue to play with the same roster in the upcoming competitive season. On Twitter, the organization announced it was bringing back its Dota 2 roster, which had been away from competitive play for a while, for the Dota Pro Circuit (DPC) 2021-22. This past season, Nigma Galaxy had a topsy-turvy campaign, missing out on a direct invite to The International 10 (TI10) by one position in the DPC points. Later, while the team came in strong in the last-resort Western European (WEU) qualifier, it did not finish first and missed the biggest Dota 2 event of the year.
Nigma Galaxy to stick together for the DPC 2021-22
“Did you miss us?! The boys are back and ready to take on the DPC season,” the organization tweeted with an image of the five players who were a part of the team in the previous season.
Nigma Galaxy’s roster ahead of the Winter Tour of the DPC 2021-22 is as follows:
Igor "iLTW" Filatov
Amer "Miracle-" Al-Barkawi
Ivan Borislavov "MinD_ContRoL" Ivanov
Maroun "GH" Merhej
Kuro "KuroKy" Salehi Takhasomi
Since failing to qualify for TI10, Nigma Galaxy had been away from competitive Dota 2 for four months. The team did not participate in some of the third party events that followed the qualifier.
Nigma Galaxy began the DPC season with a mediocre performance, barely qualifying for the Singapore Major. In the absence of offlaner MinD_ContRoL, the team performed poorly at the Major. This resulted in Aliwi "w33" Omar being placed inactive. iLTW was welcomed and the team rebounded well in the second half of the season. The top 12 teams in TI10 are directly invited, meaning this team did not receive a direct invite because it placed 13th. After regional rivals OG knocked them out in the lower bracket, the team finished third in the qualifier.
As a result, captain KuroKy failed to attend TI for the first time in his decade-long Dota 2 career, leaving Team Secret's captain Clement "Puppey" Ivanov as the only remaining TI all-timer.
As they move forward, KuroKy and his teammates will aim to improve their performance in the upcoming DPC 2021-22. Of the top teams in the Western European (WEU) circuit, Nigma Galaxy and Tundra Esports are the only ones to retain their rosters. Teams like Team Secret, Team Liquid, and others have undergone drastic changes heading into the Winter Tour of the DPC 2021-22. There are also a lot of questions surrounding the performance of each of these teams, and a lot will become clear as we begin the season on 30th Nov 2021.
