Robin “ropz” Kool is a young star from the mouz lineup who was once accused of cheating and who began his career with as few as 90 FPS in the game. CS.MONEY here to tell you how the Estonian player fought his way onto the pro scene with his play skills.
The Money Goes to Mouse and Headphones
For many Counter-Strike: Global Offensive fans, it was not until several FPL players accused Robin “ropz” Kool of cheating that the player earned his fame. However, he started his career in the usual matchmaking. At the end of June 2015, he tweeted photos with devices: mouse, headphones, charger, and some other accessories bought with his savings.
Two weeks later, Robin gained the Legendary Eagle Master rank — he tweeted about the event as well. Then he proceeded to obtain the Supreme master first class and Global elite ranks. In just a month after he published photos of his devices, ropz climbed to the top of matchmaking. And, fortunately, he didn’t stop there.
It took him ten months to reach the next milestone in his career. In April next year, he entered the top 20 players of the Master League at FACEIT and was invited to the FPL-C. By the end of the year, the Estonian player managed to move from the FPL-C to the FPL. At the age of 16, Robin “ropz” Kool had set himself beside the eSports stars, with s1mple, JW, flusha, and others his counterparts in the game.
Cheating Accusations
In January 2017 ropz took first place in the FPL and declared he was willing to accept offers from eSports teams. But instead, the player faced a hail of criticism and accusations. Jesper “JW” Wecksell claimed that Robin was an unscrupulous player and a cheater who’d never be able to partake in a LAN tournament.
Soon enough, the accusation was supported by a number of other FPL participants. To clear his good name, Robin Kool had to fly to the FACEIT office in London and play there under surveillance. There, he managed to play even better than at home.
As a result, teams literally showered the player with offers — he received offers at a pace exceeding Games of Thrones rating drops. Rumor has it that even PENTA Sports and Team Dignitas intended to collaborate with the young Estonian. Robin himself claims that his family was contacted by Team Liquid and mousesports.
Eventually, he chose the latter team. As to Liquid, ropz had to decline its offers due to time constraints. To cooperate with the team, Robin had to visit the USA, which would’ve taken too much time and impacted negatively on his studies.
The First Major
On April 12, 2017, Robin signed a contract with mouz. A month later, his team reached the semi-finals of DreamHack Open Tours 2017. However, the first year of his career can hardly be called a success in terms of performance level. In almost half of the tournaments, ropz didn’t exactly shine: often, his K/D ratio didn’t exceed 1.
At the Major, mouz performed poorly too. The team took 12-14ᵗʰ place and wasn’t able to reach the playoffs.
In the next year, 2018, ropz became a real star of mousesports. He reached the 19ᵗʰ position among the top best players of the year according to HLTV. For him, the year began with his team reaching the playoffs at ELEAGUE Major: Boston 2018. Then came the first places at StarLadder & i-League StarSeries Season 4 and ESL One: New York 2018, and silver at ESL One: Belo Horizonte 2018.
January marked another important event of the year when Jesper JW Wecksell, who was the first to accuse ropz of cheating, recanted his words and greeted Robin as a rightful member of the team.
$500,000 & 140 Capsules
Now Robin “ropz” Kool is a twenty-year-old star of the mouz lineup. He has stayed at the top of HLTV for two consecutive years, become the best player of the ESL Pro League Season 10: Finals, participated in four Majors, and brought the team more than ten first places in big tournaments.
Over five years of his career, he has earned almost half a million dollars in prize money alone. Add to this his salary and profits from the stickers — and Robin “ropz” Kool is a real CS:GO millionaire. But he also shows a huge love for stickers: in his inventory, we found more than 140 capsules from the StarLadder Berlin CS:GO Championship.
Right now Robin is playing for mouz in the playoffs of the twelfth season of the ESL Pro League. Perhaps it’ll mark another tournament victory for him?
