The favourites; Ex-ITB, Viperio, and 1PIN fell short of the task in a tournament that was billed as a showdown between the top dogs to end the year on a positive note, but Dripmen rose to the occasion and proved themselves as a force to be reckoned with as the new year approaches.
Dripmen snatched the victory from 1PIN in a close-fought series, which also saw the newly added competitive map Anubis being picked and won by Dripmen by 16-13. 1PIN fought back, converting their map pick of Vertigo with a close scoreline of 16-13. The winner was decided on Overpass, where the match went full 30 rounds and Dripmen have crowned the champions of UKIC Beyond Winter Invitational 2022 after closing it out 16-14.
Kirk “Tadpole” Stephens and Josh “JAUSTERE” Philpott were the driving force for their team. While JAUSTERE stepped up in the grand finals with a monstrous rating of 1.27, Tadpole was constantly among the top performers in his team, amassing a 1.15 rating in the eight maps he played throughout the tournament. Due to his consistently high level of play for Dripmen and having the highlight of the tournament with a 1v3 clutch, Tadpole has been crowned UKCSGO’s MVP for the UKIC Beyond Winter Invitational 2022.
This victory serves as the perfect demonstration of the depth of talent that the UK CS scene has. Dripmen have successfully proven everyone wrong, specifically those who are underrating them, according to Fraser “Frazehh” Sollom.
Stop underrating us too you fuckers, we fucked up EPS when we were a new team, but we have one of the most skilled rosters on paper, and if we are clicking together with some pracc under our belt, it's finito🗣️
— Fraser (@frazehhh) December 18, 2022
All in all, this year has been successful for the UK CS scene and Counter-Strike as a whole. We can only takeaway one fact from this win though; the next year is going to be as competitive as ever.
