Team Liquid

Team Liquid is a professional team, founded in the Netherlands in 2000. Originally a Brood War clan, the team switched to StarCraft2 during the SC2 Beta in 2010, and became one of the most successful foreign teams. On January 13, 2015, it was announced that the team had formed a Counter-Strike: Global Offensive division.[1]
Team Liquid is also strongly associated with its website, TeamLiquid.net. Launched on May 1, 2001, it has developed through the years into a focal point for StarCraft coverage, eventually became the most-browsed StarCraft-related website in the world, gathering thousands of members (including several professional players) and centralizing news about the global SC2 scene. The website also features a pro-gaming database, the TLPD, as well as a wiki dedicated to Brood War, StarCraft II, Hearthstone, Dota 2, Super Smash Brothers: Melee, Heroes of the Storm, Overwatch and Counter-Strike.

History
Founding and Early Performances

On January 13th 2015, Team Liquid made their foray into CS:GO by signing the ex-Denial eSports lineup of Damian "daps" Steele, Keith "NAF" Markovic, Eric "adreN" Hoag, Nicholas "nitr0" Canella and Jacob "FugLy" Medina with compLexity Gaming veteran Matt "Warden" Dickens as their coach. The first tournament the team attended was MLG X Games Aspen Invitational where they replaced the recently banned iBUYPOWER. The team would finish 5th-6th with their only win being against Counter Logic Gaming in the Group Stage. The team competed at Clutch Con 2015 afterwards making their first Semi-Final appearance losing to eventual winners Fnatic. Despite placing relatively well in North American tournaments they were yet to crack the international scene with last place finishes at the FACEIT League 2015 Stage 1 Finals and the Gfinity Spring Masters 2. After several changes including Warden being dropped as Coach, ex-eLevate player Johnathan "EliGE" Jablonowski replacing NAF and the addition of former Nihilum Gaming player Kyle "flowsicK" Mendez replacing daps later on, Donald "dmode" Cahill would also be brought in as their new coach. With flowsicK the team finally made it past the Group Stages in their first international premier event, the Electronic Sports World Cup 2015. This success was short-lived as they placed last at both CEVO Season 7 Professional and the FACEIT 2015 Stage 2 Finals. The team also failed to qualify for the ESL One Katowice and Cologne majors. After a period of inactivity from the big tournaments, Spencer "Hiko" Martin was eventually signed to Team Liquid replacing flowsicK on September 3rd, dmode was also replaced by James "GBJame^s" O'Connor.
First Major and more mixed results

With strong performances from EliGE and Hiko the team beat Renegades in two best-of-threes at DreamHack Stockholm 2015, which qualified them for their first major, Cluj-Napoca. However, the team did quite poor at the major finishing last place in their group with losses to Virtus.pro and Ninjas in Pyjamas. As 2016 began the team continued to truly excel domestically but ultimately still struggled at international events. During the brief player break, Team Liquid tried out former Ninjas in Pyjamas AWPer, Aleski "allu" Jalli, but was unsuccessful in signing him. They later signed the European superstar, Oleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev in FugLy's place. With another change a month later the team swapped adreN with Enemy's AWPer Kenneth "koosta" Suen when their players' contracts expired with his former organization. However, due to some complications adreN would still play for the team at the upcoming MLG Colombus major which they successfully qualified for after beating HellRaisers in the decider match.
MLG Columbus 2016

Following on from their surge in form Liquid made it past the Group Stages at MLG Colombus, beating FaZe Clan 16-11 and Fnatic 22-19. Following a 2-0 win against CLG in the Quarter-Finals the community saw them as potential favourites for the entire Tournament. However, all of these hopes would soon be dashed in an infamous Semi-Final bo3 vs Brazilian outfit Luminosity Gaming. The series began on Mirage which was Luminosity's map pick and ended with a 7-8 half in favour to the Brazilians, Liquid came back in the Pistol round and retook the lead at 11-8 and soon extended their lead to 15-9 to put them on Map Point. But amazingly Luminosity would score six consecutive rounds in order to secure overtime and eventually win the map 19-15. The next map, Cache, was Liquid’s pick and once again the team had the better start with a 9-6 lead at the first half. Liquid once again won the pistol round and started stringing rounds together until they were at map point once again. Suddenly the Luminosity side once again wouldn’t give up and won 9 rounds in a row to push the game into overtime, where Luminosity ultimately won the 19-16 to progress in their first Major Grand Final. Liquid lost a total of eleven map-winning points in the series and the game itself has been regarded by the community as one of the biggest chokes in competitive CS history. But the event at least proved Liquid could compete on the Global Stage.

ESL One Cologne 2016

On April 21st s1mple announced that he would be stepping down from the roster to join a European team as he started to miss his home. With this, adreN returned to the active roster. Another addition to the team was Luis "peacemaker" Tadeu as coach to replace GBJame^s. In the wake of the major, ESL Cologne 2016, the team swapped koosta for Counter Logic Gaming's star player and AWPer, Joshua "jdm64" Marzano, giving CLG Suen in return. They also dropped adreN and let the Ukrainian superstar s1mple stand-in for the tournament as the signing of Jacob "Pimp" Winneche took longer than expected, and was not allowed to participate at the major due to previously playing the European Minor with SK Gaming's Danish lineup. Once again the team showed up to play at the major making it past their group with a win against the French superstars’ EnVyUs. Vincent "Happy" Cervoni-Schopenhauer and co. lost to Liquid in a convincing fashion on Train, 16-7. After a loss to Virtus.pro, Liquid faced mousesports in the decider match and won 2-0 on Cobblestone and Mirage. The team had a hard draw on the quarterfinals and had to face Natus Vincere, the last major runner-up’s. The team surprisingly won 2-1 beating Na`Vi on Nuke and Cobblestone but unable to win on Train. The team moved onto the semis where the met the Swedish giants, Fnatic, whom they beat 2-0 on Cobblestone and Cache. At this point, the Liquid squad had made history making the first NA team to make it to the finals at a major. Their they met their old rivals, SK Gaming - the old Luminosity line-up signed by a new org - and unfortunately lost to them 2-0 in convincing fashion on Train and Cobblestone. After the major the team’s next major event and the new man Pimp’s first event was ESL One: New York 2016, where they did very well making it past groups beating G2 Esports and Fnatic twice. In the semi-finals the team encountered the CIS powerhouse, who had their former teammate, s1mple. Unfortunately, the squad lost 2-1 to Na`Vi who went onto win the tournament. After ESL One: New York, the team started to falter as they continued to struggle to make it past groups. Although Liquid did manage to pick up a new coach, Wilton "zews" Prado, at Northern Arena 2016 - Montreal.
Team:
Nicholas "nitrO" Channela
Jonathan "EliGE" Jablonowski
Russel "Twistzz" Van Dulken
Keith "NAF" Markovic
Epitácio "TACO" de Melo
Wilton "zews" Prado (Coach)

Info from liquipedia
https://liquipedia.net/counterstrike/Team_Liquid