ENCE bench doto

ENCE have announced the benching of Joonas "⁠doto⁠" Forss ahead of the start of the 2022 season.

The Finnish organization has cited a need for changes in order for the team to take the next step as the reason for the benching of the 25-year-old. Their new fifth player will be announced "in the coming weeks."

doto leaves ENCE after a year-long tenure. He joined what was still a Finnish squad at the time alongside Eetu "⁠sAw⁠" Saha from HAVU in late 2020, a period that saw the organization decide to go international with the roster.

In early 2021, the team underwent a large-scale overhaul with only the two new additions and Aleksi "⁠allu⁠" Jalli remaining, as Marco "⁠Snappi⁠" Pfeiffer, Lotan "⁠Spinx⁠" Giladi, and Paweł "⁠dycha⁠" Dycha were brought on.

A few months later, allu stepped away from the game and was replaced by Olek "⁠hades⁠" Miskiewicz, and after working their way up the ranks ENCE reached their peak #7 ranking in early November following their playoffs finish at ESL Pro League Season 14 and a run to second place at IEM Fall.

In the last two months, however, ENCE couldn't replicate that form. Despite a successful first stage at the PGL Major Stockholm, the European side went out in last place of the Legends Stage in an abysmal showing and went on to bomb out in groups at DreamHack Open November and at IEM Winter, having won just one in their last eight matches.

"We felt we needed to make some changes to keep us in the fight against the best teams," ENCE's General Manager, Niklas "Willkey" Ojalainen, said. "After carefully assessing the market and what we had in our roster, we felt this change needed to be made."

ENCE now have:

Marco "⁠Snappi⁠" Pfeiffer
Lotan "⁠Spinx⁠" Giladi
Paweł "⁠dycha⁠" Dycha
Olek "⁠hades⁠" Miskiewicz

Eetu "⁠sAw⁠" Saha (coach)

Joonas "⁠doto⁠" Forss (benched)