ENCE shake up their roster by benching Valde and bringing in HENU as a stand-in

Finnish esports organization, ENCE, has announced the removal of Danish rifler, Valdemar "valde" Bjørn Vangså, from the active roster due to differences in playstyle compared to the rest of the team. The team has been struggling to reach the same level of performance they were at before losing Lotan "Spinx" Giladi to Vitality in 2022. This decision comes after a slow start to 2023 for ENCE, which includes being eliminated from the IEM Katowice group stage following losses to Cloud9 and Complexity.

Valde's benching marks the end of a six-month stint with ENCE. The Dane's best finish with the team was a second-place finish at ESL Challenger Rotterdam. ENCE's General Manager, Niklas "Willkey" Ojalainen, thanked valde for his time with the team and contributions as a hardworking player and a great teammate. "We have reached the conclusion to bench valde due to differences in his playstyle compared to the rest of the team," said Ojalainen. "Unfortunately, it hasn’t clicked as well as we had hoped during the past six months, but we want to thank valde for his time with us and his contributions."

Academy player Henri "HENU" Ylilehto will temporarily stand in for the team at the upcoming CCT Central Europe Malta Finals until a permanent solution for the starting five is found. ENCE has shown renewed interest in Israeli player, Guy "Nertz" Iluz, who was a target of the Finnish organization in the summer of 2022. Nertz missed the Blast.tv Paris Major's RMR qualifier with Endpoint for personal reasons, and ENCE could potentially make a move for the 23-year-old.

ENCE will head to Malta with their academy youngster, HENU, for the CCT Central Europe Malta Finals on February 16-19. The team will be competing for the share of $100,000 and a spot at the CCT Global Finals. While ENCE has hit a rough patch in their recent performances, they are undoubtedly still a team to watch in the competitive CS:GO scene, and fans will be eagerly awaiting the outcome of the upcoming tournament.