FalleN heads to last big CS:GO event in Brazil

Despite not being a Major this time around, the defending IEM Rio champions Virtus.pro (formerly Outsiders) will not be in attendance to defend their title in Brazil next week. Announcing their decision to withdraw from the tournament via Twitter, the organization cited their current form as the reason behind the decision following their recent failure to make it out of the EU RMR for the BLAST.tv Paris Major.

In their stead, Dust2.us in cooperation with Dust2 Brasil, knows that Gabriel "FalleN" Toledo's Imperial will be VP's replacement, with the Brazilian squad hoping for a better result than their last-place finish at the previous iteration of IEM Rio.

Imperial had a rough time during their last outing in Brazil in November. The squad was still fielding Fernando "fer" Alvarenga and failed to win a single map, losing to Vitality and 9z in BO1 action, before succumbing to Cloud9 2-0 in the elimination game. Since then, fer has been replaced by Jhonatan "JOTA" Willian but results have remained underwhelming for the Brazilians. Failing to make it out of either South American Open Qualifier for IEM Rio, Imperial lost to O PLANO and Fluxo, respectively.

With the matchups already announced, Imperial will directly replace Virtus.pro in Group A which gives them an opening-round game against Ninjas in Pyjamas. IEM Rio kicks off on April 17th, where 16 teams will fight it out for a chance at the lion's share of $250,000.