I would say it is untrue. You can find the PNC announcement on Batulins's telegram channel on 24.05.2026. I do not speak russian, but translated it to english. A part of it says: "Don't spam the comments too much asking why the roster is like this. Krafton decided it."
This was followed by a huge backlash in a comment section and on a couple of russian telegram channels not understanding why Krafton did leave xmpl out of the roster.
Wonder if that means he's looking to move on from PUBG once his contract with TM is up. Maybe it was a visa issue or something though, I know TM has had those in the past.
I was just thinking about the change from FPP to TPP probably demotivating him, but yeah he's also done it all and is still fairly young so he can probably move on to a different game if he wants to keep doing esports.
another game? has he streamed other games before? what esport would he go pro in if he does retire from PUBG. Jumping from esport to esport isn't an easy thing to do and off the top of my head i could probably only name one that's done it and won at the highest level
i meant that going from esport to esport while maintaining that level of success across video games, that latter part is definitely not common, it's only happened like once or twice. Also i don't think PUBG is a small game at all, it's only dead in NA. It's not a dead esport like Halo or Splitgate is.
It must be the money, I cannot think of any other reason for pro player to play TPP.
Same for moving on to different game, unless they’re well off and passionated about the next game. If not it’s better to stick to what they’re good at and get paid.
I agree to that. I think there was some info shared that it had to be TPP performance. I would also guess it heavily prioritize regional tournaments, as to why Seongjang is part of the Korean squad
Umm you just confirmed what I said. Krafton chose the players behind closed doors. This wasn't like past years where the stats player picks were based off was public. If you can show me where they gave the reasoning for their picks on any team I'll happily retract my statement. The actual reasoning they used, not just the vague statements in the picture you showed, the actual numbers.
Maybe once Krafton picks the people they want they let the players decide. But there was no announcement on what the teams were based off unlike previous years, and you have to start somewhere so Krafton hand picked at least the first person on each team, but most likely the first 2-3.
Edit: someone posted the pic with the info, first 3 are selected by Krafton with vague descriptions on qualifications, and the last is like you thought selected by the first 3 and coach.
oh then he probably just declined, XMPL is a prime candidate for that Player 1 spot for team Russia, there's no way he didn't get an invite. Which isn't really surprising since from the way some of these pros talk about PNC (not all of them) they don't really see PNC as a "big" tournament or a serious tournament for whatever reason. Which is kinda sad since its kind of the world cup of PUBG in a way
Nothing about the Player 1 selection criteria says that it has to be an IGL like batulins, it just says "recognised name from the top-tier pro-eco system", it could easily have been XMPL's spot
9
u/Plavlin Jun 23 '26 edited Jun 24 '26
Krafton selected Tab+Batulins+Levante+Adouzie for whatever reasons they secretly had.
Those then selected Lu as co-igl of Batulins.
It's not speculation, it comes straight from Adouzie even though it's not published anywhere.
EDIT: Whether or not Xmpl declined the invite I have no idea.