We're already in April 2010 and FnaticMSI.CS's last year performance still seems to persist and stay with many of you. Their six major titles have already placed them in the 2009 Esports Yearbook, with an entire chapter by Simon Bidwell dedicated to the chronological evolution of the team throughout 2009.

Remembering the days of 2009 is always interesting and this write-up seems to sum it all up fully, good and bad, funny and serious. The words quoted below speak for themselves, no need for additions:

19th January 2009: After two years wearing the
fnatic colours, Oskar “ins” Holm called to an end his
illustrious gaming career, taking with him his trademark
red hat. His replacement, former SK Gaming
player, Christopher “GeT_RiGhT” Alesund.
24th February 2009: Just two weeks after Holm’s
retirement, Oscar “Archi” Torgersen, one of the team’s
original members quit the side after three years, leaving
fnatic with just four players before the upcoming
IEM Continental finals in Hannover, Germany.
3rd -5th March 2009: Rasmus “GuX” Stahl of Lag
Blank replaced Torgersen in the fnatic lineup, infusing
the team with fresh blood. With only two weeks
to practice with the new lineup, little was expected of
fnatic at the IEM Continental Finals, but they took 4th
place, claiming $4000.00 and more importantly, nabbing
the last spot for the IEM III Global finals a few
days later. It was a baptism of fire for their new recruits

19th January 2009: After two years wearing the fnatic colours, Oskar “ins” Holm called to an end his illustrious gaming career, taking with him his trademark red hat. His replacement, former SK Gaming player, Christopher “GeT_RiGhT” Alesund.

24th February 2009: Just two weeks after Holm’s retirement, Oscar “Archi” Torgersen, one of the team’s original members quit the side after three years, leaving fnatic with just four players before the upcoming IEM Continental finals in Hannover, Germany.

3rd -5th March 2009: Rasmus “GuX” Stahl of Lag Blank replaced Torgersen in the fnatic lineup, infusing the team with fresh blood. With only two weeks to practice with the new lineup, little was expected of fnatic at the IEM Continental Finals, but they took 4th place, claiming $4000.00 and more importantly, nabbing the last spot for the IEM III Global finals a few days later. It was a baptism of fire for their new recruits.

5th-8th March 2009: Now however the team seemed to be playing with a new lease of life. They romped through the groupstage ending on a round difference of +56 before storming through the brackets only losing 5 rounds to both mTw and SK. It was in the final they faced their first challenge, the Poles of MYM. After a dominating first half performance on Nuke, fnatic were 13:2 up before MYM staged the unlikeliest of comebacks, tieing the score up at 13:13 before the Swede’s closed out the remaining rounds and the game. The final will go down as one of the most exciting games in CS 1.6’s history, but it also brought to the fore a more aim based game style that made fnatic so dominant that weekend.

25th-26th April 2009: Returned to their throne as 1.6 kings, fnatic came into the EPS.SCA finals as favourites, but a resurgent mTw denied the young fnatic team the prize that weekend. The final left Patrick “cArn” Sattermon looking visibly down as he was interviewed by ESL TVs Matt Rider.

2nd-6th May 2009: The disappointment of EPS.SCA spurred on fnatic and at their next tournament, ESWC Cheonan, they comprehensively beat closest rivals SK Gaming 2-0, after losing to them in the group stages. AWPer Harley “dsn” Orwall had an extremely impressive tournament, notching up huge scores throughout.

8th-10th May 2009: Next the fnatic train rolled into Moscow, Russia, for the Kode5 Grand finals. Again the final was an all Swedish affair, and again the pain kept coming for SK Gaming with fnatic winning 2-0, taking Nuke 16-10 and Inferno 16-5 as well as returning home to Sweden with the $25000.00 prize.

23rd August 2009: To celebrate the kickoff of the fourth season of the Extreme Masters, ESL held a ‘1.6 supercup’ at Gamescom in Cologne, and it was here fnatic lived up to their infamous partying reputation. After having enjoyed the players party the night before, fnatic finished a disappointing 4th, even though it was one of the minor tournaments of the year, and Harley “dsn” Orwall appeared on stage without his fnatic jersey. Sam Matthews posed a particularly glum figure after their loss to Mouz.

1st-3rd October 2009: Gracious in victory and gracious in defeat, the fnatic winning spree in major tournaments finally came to an end at the Intel Extreme Masters 4 Global Challenge Chengdu, with a renewed SK Gaming lineup exacting some revenge in a hard fought final.

24th-26th July 2009: Returning to Korea after ESWC Cheonan, it looked as if fnatic would face local rivals SK Gaming in the final for the 3rd tournament running; however home favourites WeMadeFox who made it into the final before hitting the brick wall that was the Swedes from fnatic. Winning eStars Seoul 2009 also meant that fnatic remained the reigning champions of the event, having won back in 2007 and 2008. After eStars Seoul, team captain, Patrick “cArn” Sattermon, appeared on radio-show LO3 saying “we’re probably the best team ever”.

11th-15th November: Over the years there’s been one title that has eluded the ranks of fnatic’s counterstrike team, the World Cyber Games. It was thought that 2009 might finally be the year the Swedes would win the event, and there is a sort of symmetry in that, fnatic’s first major title of 2009 came against the then Poles of MYM and that their opposition in the WCG final would again be the Poles, just this time under the name AGAiN. And just like the meeting way back in March, the match did not disappoint, going to quadruple overtime in the first map, Nuke, finishing 28-26 in favour of AGAiN before the Poles took Train 16-12, leaving fnatic with the silver medal and fans a match they will remember for a long, long time.

26-29th November 2009: With 2009 drawing to a close, there were only two major events left that fnatic would be attending, DreamHack Winter and WEM. After a long year the team finished a disappointing 5th-8th at Dreamhack Winter, but Christopher “GeT_RiGhT” Alesund was seen showing off a gold SteelSeries mouse that his 2009 has deserved, having won the eSports Player of the year, eSports team of the year and Best Counterstrike player at the eSports awards as well as his team collecting an estimated $153122 in prize money.

17th-25th October 2009: With the amount of prize winnings fnatic had accumulated over the year, they’d probably feel home in Dubai, the location of their next tournament, but the team also showed their hunger despite numerous victories, taking the EM 4 Global Challenge Dubai, and having their revenge on SK gaming before beating MYM.Swe in the finals. All of the top 3 finishers at Dubai were Swedish teams, showing the nations dominance over CS 1.6.

This is an integral quote from the 2009 Esports Yearbook. To check out the entire material by Simon Bidwell, simply click here. Other than that, FnaticMSI.CS will certainly be around this year as well, hopefully providing everyone with more materials for the 2010 Esports Yearbook.