FUT has announced the addition of Álvaro ‘SunPayus’ García to its Counter-Strike roster, benching Mykyta ‘cmtry’ Samolotov in the process. The signing of the former G2 AWPer is a fascinating clash of style between a player and his new roster.
Insider Gaming looks at the positives and negatives of SunPayus’s move to FUT, and whether the move will take FUT to the next level or leave them wanting more.
cmtry Benching a long-expected move
The move has received mixed reactions from the CS community and fans. On the one hand, those who closely follow FUT’s matches have always known that cmtry was the weak link in the roster.
While the FUT roster has been, at times, top 5 in the VRS, cmtry is clearly not a top 5 AWPer or close to it. The 19-year-old routinely misses what spectators often call ‘the easy shots.’
Not only that, his decision-making has frequently let himself and his team down, with questionable swings and positioning.
The Ukrainian has averaged a mediocre 0.99 HLTV rating in 2026, a year when this FUT roster has otherwise taken great strides in the right direction.
The player is failing statistically, but even more so on the eye test, where the young AWPer is actively throwing rounds for this roster.
Moving from Tier 2 to Tier 1, AWPing is undoubtedly the most difficult role to adjust to at the highest level, with higher fundamentals and counter-stratting in the Tier 1 space. It seems cmtry isn’t quite ready for the level the team has now reached.
The question really isn’t whether cmtry is FUT’s weakest link; it is whether it is worth making the change for SunPayus specifically.
Is SunPayus the man to replace cmtry on FUT?
So what does SunPayus offer to FUT? The main aspect is undoubtedly stability. SunPayus is not a player to take a stupid swing; quite the opposite.
The AWPer will play Counter-Strike by the book, at sometimes to his detriment, but that is perhaps all FUT needs to succeed.
After all, the roster has already captured one Tier 1 trophy at PGL Bucharest 2026, finishing second at the Esports World Cup 2026 in a highly competitive field.
The roster has gotten that far because of the firepower inherent in its rifling core, and that rifling core has no lack of aggression to make up for SunPayus’s passive nature.
The AWPer can hold angles, throw supportive utility, and generally act as a solid foundation for FUT’s rounds, removing the negative aspects of cmtry’s play from the roster.
On the negative side, there is little evidence that the Spaniard will set the world alight, averaging a moderately better 1.03 HLTV rating in 2026. SunPayus overall had a lack of impact in G2, but he arguably doesn’t need to have that impact on FUT.
The more concerning aspects of SunPayus’s potential on FUT are twofold: Rifling and chemistry.
In an era when the best AWPers are more and more becoming hybrid AWPing riflers, SunPayus is a pure AWPer, lacking finesse on the rifle and statistically struggling.
That aspect calls into question how he will help his team, especially on T-sides where AWPing is generally less relevant, even more so in games where the economy starts in a bad place.
But really, more than any individual metric, the question of whether SunPayus works in this team really comes down to how FUT functions as a roster.
The team has grown together over the years, graduating from NAVI Junior and now to the FUT roster together. Until now, four of those five NAVI Junior players have been together the entire time, with only Drin ‘makazze’ Shaqiri leaving the team upon graduation to FUT’s main roster.
makazze’s separation from the roster led to Laurențiu ‘lauNx’ Țârlea and now Yasin ‘xfl0ud’ Koç being part of the roster. lauNx left the roster over differences with the team, xfl0ud is the roster’s worst performer after cmtry.
Can SunPayus integrate himself into FUT’s tight-knit team? Certainly, on a philosophical level, the player could not seem more different than FUT’s playstyle.
Aggressive, bombastic, risk-taking; SunPayus is none of those things. His team will inevitably make plays he’s uncomfortable with, plays which he disagrees with at a fundamental level, plays which will start disagreements within the roster.
For an opinionated player, a headstrong personality, that may not be easy to deal with, especially when faced with a roster core that is totally aligned in that vision.
On the other hand, it is perhaps through that meshing of perspectives that SunPayus can grant FUT both balance in a round and as a team in general.
We will have to wait and see as FUT debuts their new lineup at PGL Masters Bucharest 2026, the site of their greatest victory in Counter-Strike. A positive start will go a long way towards building up goodwill within the roster, and they may need that.
Do you think the move could work? Share your thoughts with us on the Insider Gaming Discord.
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Darragh is an Esports Journalist for Insider Gaming specialising in Counter-Strike. He loves to explore how esports teams work, or why they very often do not.
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