2024 has so far been an incredible year for CS. Spirit, G2, FaZe, MOUZ, and NAVI have all won S-tier events so far this year, with each team establishing themselves as a great team throughout the process of winning.
The year has been one of the most competitive in CS history, so we thought it was a fitting time to look back at some of the greatest rosters in CS history to see who could have potentially cut through and dominated if they were in their prime in 2024.
To get our list of the best rosters in CS history, we turned to bubzkji for his knowledge and expertise.
The roster:
How else could bubzkji have opened his list of the best rosters in CS history than with Astralis?
If you know anything about Counter-Strike, you know all about this team and what their reign meant for the game. During their run they won three consecutive Majors, the inaugural Intel Grand Slam, and revolutionised the way the game was played. So, not much then, really.
Born out of the controversial departure of Kjaerbye to their Danish rivals North, the arrival of Magisk catapulted Astralis to a level never before seen in Counter-Strike. The team perfected the idea of roles with their adaptive style that added fluidity to their precise structure and used utility in a way that every team was forced to copy in hopes of catching up with them.
The roster:
Everyone expected the Counter-Strike scene to be in flux after the pandemic, but that wasn’t the case as NAVI rose to be the dominant force in the world across 2021. Buoyed by the star power of s1mple, electroNic, and Perfecto and boosted by their new wonderkid b1t, their combined abilities raised an almost impossible question to answer: who could rival this team?
As it happened, it didn’t take long to answer that question. FaZe added ropz to their team at the very start of 2022 and would very quickly become the dominant force in CS. Wins at IEM Katowice, IEM Cologne, ESL Pro League Season 15, and the PGL Major Antwerp saw them pick up four of the most important events in the first half of the year, a run that would see them overcome the incredible NAVI squad in the Major final, as well as NiKo, huNter-, and m0NESY in the Katowice final.
FaZe slowed down after that point and failed to win an event for the rest of 2022, but 2023 saw them complete their Intel Grand Slam as they beat Cloud9 in the final of ESL Pro League Season 17. Later that year they would become the dominant force in the first months of CS2, winning three straight finals and appearing in another before Twistzz departed for Liquid.
The roster:
The next team picked by bubzkji for our list of the best rosters in CS history was fnatic’s 2015-2016 roster, a team that managed to maintain their success despite losing their IGL towards the end of 2015.
The most impressive achievement from this legendary team was their back-to-back Major wins at ESL One: Katowice 2015 and ESL One: Cologne 2015. These successive Major wins meant that fnatic became the first of three teams to win consecutive Majors, something that seemed an almost impossible achievement up until that point.
They also won the inaugural season of ESL Pro League, beating Cloud9 3-1 in the final as well as Virtus.pro in the semi-finals. Later, with dennis, they would go on to add the second season of Pro League to their trophy cabinet, as well as FACEIT League 2015 stage three finals and another Katowice win in 2016.
The roster:
Next up, we have a revolutionary team, the iconic Brazilian squad that won back-to-back Majors in 2016. This may seem unimpressive considering fnatic did it the year before, but you have to remember that CS:GO was a European game before FalleN and Co. came along.
Not only did the team manage to win two consecutive Majors, but they managed to do so while hailing from a region that historically hadn’t enjoyed much success in CS:GO and suddenly became a force to be reckoned with as coldzera became one of the greatest players the game has ever seen.
They also did so with an entirely unorthodox style of play, one that revolved around FalleN operating as an AWP IGL. Add in some incredibly iconic plays, and now you have one unforgettable, powerful team.
The roster:
The penultimate team in bubzkji’s list of the best rosters in CS history is the Liquid team that completed their Intel Grand Slam run in an incredible 63 days back in 2019.
Always behind Astralis in the year prior, the addition of Stewie2k to the roster gave Liquid the cutting edge and the winning mentality they needed, and what came next is the stuff of legend.
Naysayers will always try to take away from this squad’s achievements because of their lack of a Major, but the run they went on would have impressive by even Astralis’ standards, and we’ve never seen anything like it since.
The roster:
The final team in bubzkji’s list of the best rosters in CS history is NAVI’s 2021 roster.
The dominant team towards the tail end of the online era, unlike many of the other teams that had shone during that time, NAVI actually managed to keep their form up after the return to LAN.
s1mple was on another level during this time, but what was most impressive was their seamless integration of a rookie in b1t and just how well he performed. That, and the fact they won the first Major back after COVID, one that we are all sure to remember for a very long time, especially seeing as they did so by becoming the first team to win a Major without dropping a single map.
BLAST ApS., Hauser Plads 1, 3., 1127 Copenhagen