I made a short list of things you should focus on to get better:

- Start the round going for safe picks/contesting choke points in a way where the peak is to your advantage (do not over-peak/overcommit to the peak, just ensuring we maintain map control early).

- Fall back and hold for pushes trying to understand where their site anchors are and how they are rotating.

- Every map has two main choke points where you need someone to contest random pushes

- After establishing a feel for rotations, start to challenge map control and work toward taking a site (We want to do our best to limit the opponent’s information. Shy away from forcing the issue into a crossfire. We want to catch their rotators off guard. The goal of the round should be to isolate a player, get a pick, reset and pinch a site).

- After you’ve gained your information, you decide what you want to do. There are strategies for developing and forcing predictable behaviour in the opposing team. You want them adapting to us.

- If you make the start of every round look the same, it forces the other team to spread out and respect your map control. It means that when you finally decide to take a site, each player will be relatively isolated. They won’t know where you’re going until the last minute, and it’ll prevent a quick flank or a quick rotation giving you time to plant and set up strong post-plants/crossfires positions.

- Try your best to take fights when you know your teammate are in a position to trade. It is as much your teammate’s responsibility to rotate over to support as it is for you to delay until your teammate can’t get into a position to support you. Remember, the other team is trying to isolate the two of you, and create an opening. Do your best to delay/prevent that from happening).

- During scrims, whenever you are frustrated about a given scenario or feel like we as a team are doing something wrong I want you to write it down. We will discuss it as a team.

- Of course there are exceptions to each of these rules, especially when it comes down to x vs. x situations, but the same principles apply. Every fight you take, whether you win or die, should be to help put your team in a position to secure the round. Don’t expect people to be able to read your mind. Communicate every decision you make until it becomes ingrained/second nature for your team.

- The sooner you buy into a system and start to read situations the same way as your team, the less need you will have to communicate the details. If all of these principles become second nature, you can focus on fragging.

- Patience, communication, and consistency are important.

- Everyone has strengths and preferences on each map so express them and we can develop strategies with those things in mind. That being said, everyone should strive to become well-rounded players, because depending on how a round unfolds, you might have to pick up any role.

- Think about how the decisions you are making will impact the outcome of the round and act accordingly.

- Don’t become indecisive during matches. Practice how you will play. Be decisive and trust your teammates.

- Scrims and matches rarely go perfect, but trust the process. Aim and the RNG of the game is something we as a team cannot control. You can focus on those types of play on your own time. During scrims focus on understanding how to be decisive in different situations in a way that helps put your teammates in a position to make a play or win the round.

- It’s important to understand how every round you win and every round you lost unfolded as a result of positioning. For now, focus less on the frag and instead on how a pick effected rotations and how it helped open up areas of the map.

- At a high level, everyone can aim, it’s more about picking the right fights, map control, and putting your teammates in a position to win the round.

- Every team, whether a legit team, or a pug develops predictable patterns of behaviour, whether it be go to strats, defaults, or ways of going about creating opening round picks. Do your best to keep tabs of these things so that you can gain the advantage in one-on-one exchanges.

- Adapt and adjust accordingly. Do your best to be unpredictable. Give them different looks and setups.

- Perfect throwing pop flashes for the people around you on the map. It’s easy to turn from flashes that you throw for yourself. If a pop flash is thrown for your teammates however, its far more effect. Understand the nature of a pop flash. A perfect pop flash doesn’t bounce, doesn’t make a sound, it pops as soon as it turns a corner and the people it is intended to blind do not have a time to react. Too many people throw half ass pop flashes, don’t be that guy, it really makes the difference between a mediocre and high level player.

- One way smokes, learn them all, use them for safe picks sparingly, and learn to pre-fire all of them.

- Use mollys on eco rounds and do your best to have a teammate nearby with a rifle out when you’re throwing nades for an execute or impromptu play.

- Learn to always anticipate peaks/counter nades, especially in matches. A lot of mediocre teams waste utility early on in rounds, keep track of what’s been used and where. It can make the difference between a successful execute and poor one.

- Assume your teammates don’t have all the info. If you get caught off guard by a random push its your responsibility. Don’t relax during matches.

- Do your best to isolate players, executing into a crossfire with players who have all their utility is asking to be aced.

- Try to take fights in post plant positions where your teammates are in a position to take that fight as well. Try to peak opponents as they push forward, not as they hold angles. And try to take fights when you know your teammates can engage them too.

- Seamless transitions in between strats mid round is something every team should work toward and this goes hand in hand with efficient round time management.

- Take advantage of spot peaks, you don’t always peak for frags, peak for info, it may even be more important than anything. If you can find out what teams are setting up for, you understand how to counter them.

- Understand how teams will react to you collecting info, because some may be baiting you into identifying what appears to be a weakness but is in reality quite deliberate. Some may jet for the other site anticipating you identifying a weakness, so understand who you are playing against. Understand that and act accordingly.

- Master the 2-3 bullet burst and fall back. Do your best to stay mobile, getting caught static is a recipe for disaster.

- When you find out where you’re playing on a map, find out how exactly your teammates around you like being supported. What kinds of flashes they like being thrown. What kinds of flashes they like to throw. Expectations of how they anticipate your rotation.

- Understand when a position you’re playing has been compromised and don’t be afraid to fall, just do not forget to communicate that you are doing so.

- Don’t feel obliged to hold an angle. Falling back into another crossfire as opposed to forcing a fight in an area where you know your position has been compromised may be the more viable option and more valuable to your team in the goal of securing the round.

- Commit to the frag when you’re in a crossfire. Play with decisiveness. Don’t second guess yourself.

- Using flashes to force a teammate or multiple teammates into chokepoints either for information or use later on in a round is extremely important.

- The more map control you have, the less information the other team has, and the better able you will be to take advantage of the round when the time comes to execute.

- Getting an opening pick by isolating someone and peaking from multiple angles is one of my favourite way