shox opens up about reasons for parting with Liquid

French player Richard "shox" Papillon has opened up about the circumstances that led to his departure from the Liquid main roster. The experienced esports athlete singled out two main reasons: the impossibility of a complete move to the United States and burnout amid a suboptimal workflow.

According to the player, initially, he was supposed to move to the United States with his family and spend almost half of 2022 in this country. For various reasons, this plan could not be implemented, which negatively affected Papillon's psychological state.

It was agreed that I would be in the US for two specific periods of 3 months and 2 months in 2022. I discussed this with my wife, and we thought that it could be beneficial as a life experience, for me, for her, for the little one too, for us. Discovering a new culture, new ways of thinking, a new way of living can only be enriching to us and we were ready to embark on this "American Dream".

Everything was coming true and we were ready to embark on this American adventure at 200%! Unfortunately, as time went by, it turned out that I was supposed to be in the United States for tournaments taking place on American soil, but according to the information I was given, they were almost all either cancelled or relocated to Europe for administrative reasons.

As a result, in the middle of the season, it was a big blow for my family and me because this American life will not see the light of day as planned, at least not before maybe October 2022. <...> As a consequence, I find myself having my life in France but having the life and agenda of an American player which immediately makes things very very complicated. I'm always on the move, I have no time to relax and recover from this overloaded CS schedule. I'm either in bootcamp, or in tournaments, or in media shoots, or in the US to do regional qualifiers like BLAST, RMR, Dallas Qualif... Not having a home in the US, I was either in a hotel during these periods or at the manager's house (Steve) that I thank from the bottom of my heart because knowing my situation, he did everything to make my trip as pleasant as possible, many thanks for his accommodation.

Papillon noted that the reason for his burnout was the constant traveling between the continents, the need to practice from home, as well as the gradual deterioration of the team's results.

I continued to give what I could give until the end, even though I felt like I was getting very tired with all the ups and downs but I couldn't do anything else, so I gritted my teeth and made it to the end. At the end of the major, I had a burnout, I had to go home as soon as possible (that's why I wasn't present in Antwerp for the finals and I apologize for all the fans who were waiting for my presence).

I also realized that from the beginning of January until the major, I was only about 25 days at home, half of them being on American working hours so from 7pm until 2 or 3am.

The information about shox's benching in Liquid came on June 19. Coach Eric "adreN" Hoag left the team along with the Frenchman and was soon replaced by Damian "daps" Steele.

Currently, Liquid have yet to decide on a full-fledged replacement for shox. At the upcoming IEM Cologne 2022, however, Mareks "YEKINDAR" Galinskis will play for the team as a standin.

Origin: twitter.com