Into The Breach (ITB) have decided to release their academy team at the end of the month. Only two months after its initial announcement, ITB Academy’s IGL Kamil “Klameczka” Mętel revealed on X that the academy roster will depart Into The Breach.
The roster intends to continue developing together while they search for opportunities under a new organisation. UKCSGO understands that the decision was made as a result of the inability of the roster to further develop under the ITB umbrella due to tournament clashes with the senior roster.
With ITB’s main roster currently sitting at #82 in the Valve Rankings, the team has struggled significantly to progress in the way that was envisaged when the roster was initially conceived. With the benching of Mohammad “BOROS” Malhas, ITB remains in the cycle of accepting invites to lower-level tournaments in order to move up the rankings.
As tournament rules generally prohibit multiple teams from the same organisation, the academy team was left with few invites and little chance to develop and grow through officials outside of ESEA advanced. As such the decision was made that it was not the right time for Into The Breach to have an academy roster. There has been no official word from the organisation regarding the academy project as of yet, but any potential for a future academy project may depend on the main team’s success.
In ESEA advanced, the roster started strong to move to a 6-1 record, beating Navi Junior in the process, before narrowly missing out on playoffs with an 8-6 record overall. Despite that disappointment, the roster’s potential was made evident by their victory in the inaugural 500 Cash Cup in September.
ITB Academy’s British coach, Elliot “Stoick” Meccano-Thomas, will not join the roster going forward, instead deciding to take a step away from Counter-Strike. However, he expressed satisfaction with the progression of the roster to UKCSGO and backed the roster’s future potential:
I think the big thing I brought to the table was structure. Things like practice schedules, proper review sessions, and an organised stratbook were where I focused, because every one of them brought strategy to the board I could focus on administrative roles. They’ve done really well with it and I’m sure if they take all we’ve done onboard they’ve got a bright future ahead.
ITB Academy’s roster at release is as follows:
Kamil “Klameczka” Mętel
Szymon “sk1tt” Rogoziński
Adrian “AdrieN” Mucha
Oskar “hfah” Wroński
Vitaliy “yukitoro” Protas
Elliot “Stoick” Meccano-Thomas (coach)
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