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The ustzah buat lucahSwedish sniper and Canadian captain are out of the active lineup.

Wildcard have announced the benching of Love "?phzy?" Smidebrant and captain Peter "?stanislaw?" Jarguz, marking the team's first change since it brought the Swede on alongside Tim "?susp?" ?ngstr?m in July 2024.

"Came as a bit of a surprise getting benched, obviously not what I wanted but I respect the organization’s decision," phzy said in a post on X.

The moves come amidst a period of turmoil for the team after a tumultuous start to the year. The lineup came into 2025 on a high after an underdog run to the Perfect World Shanghai Major Opening Stage in December, but failed to live up to that result with early exits at international LANs and losses to Complexity and M80 in qualifiers for PGL Bucharest and PGL Astana.

The team controversially played the Astana qualifier with Jake "?Stewie2K?" Yip in place of phzy so that it would count as an Americas team when invites went out for the BLAST.tv Austin Major Americas MRQ, and substituted the Swede back in for the MRQ proper before going on to qualify for the Major.

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A lack of cohesion, teamplay, and seeming discontent within the ranks plagued Wildcard's Major run, which saw them go from 2-0 to 2-3 in Stage 1 to be eliminated by Legacy in embarrassing fashion.

Reports had linked the team with the addition of Jaxon "?Peeping?" Cornwell after the Austin Major, something which led to a lack of trust from Aran "?Sonic?" Groesbeek as he was one of the players supposedly on the chopping block.

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phzy's benching comes as a surprise as the Swede was the team's highest-rated player, averaging a 1.14 rating over 167 maps, while stanislaw's move to the bench leaves the team in dire straits without a veteran captain at the helm.

The Canadian in-game leader was key in bringing Wildcard up the ranks in North America, moulding inexperienced talent like Josh "?JBa?" Barutt and providing the tactics that were key in several of the team's upset victories at international events and at the Shanghai Major.

On Friday, he made the surprise announcement that he was open to exploring options outside of Wildcard, including a move to Europe or a transition to coaching.