“It's just a mistake” - neilzinho on ComeBack and his exit from Heretics

The day before their second match in VALORANT Champions Tour 2026 - EMEA Stage 1, Team Heretics announced that Berkcan "ComeBack" Şentürk was leaving the team and Martynas "Koshmaras" Namikas would take his place. The roster move came as a shock, as it happened mid-stage and marked the departure of one of the best Turkish players in the scene.

After their match against Team Liquid, THESPIKE had the opportunity to sit down with Head Coach Neil "neilzinho" Finlay to talk about the roster changes and what was happening behind the scenes.

Another loss on the board

The day after ComeBack’s departure, Team Heretics faced one of the top contenders in Group Alpha, Team Liquid. With a completely new rookie on the roster, Head Coach neilzinho knew it would be a tough match.

Our prep was obviously a little bit different this time just because of the situation we were in. Like we knew the risks of obviously bringing someone in this quick. So we just had to kind of keep what we had from before and fit caution to everything we prepared.

The series ended 2-0 in favor of Liquid, leaving Heretics at the bottom of their group with an 0-2 record.

Comeback's Exit

For some time, Heretics had been transparent about ongoing communication issues, which prevented the team from performing at its full potential. Much of this was tied to their Turkish player ComeBack, who was still learning English. Despite lessons and effort, the team didn’t see the necessary progress and ultimately decided to part ways.

Communication has always been one of our strongest points as a team. We knew it was a huge risk taking on someone that couldn't speak English. We just expected a bit more in terms of how much he was able to integrate himself and the level just wasn't there in terms of English and communication.

The final turning point came after their match against Natus Vincere the previous week. Neilzinho explained that after the loss, the team disagreed on how the game should be played. When discussing the way to play for an advantage and overpeaking, ComeBack and the rest of the roster had different philosophies. From a coaching perspective, that wasn’t something fixable.

That's a fundamental kind of disagreement with the team and it's not something that I'm willing to compromise on. He sent me a message that night just saying, ”I can't fit in the team, I'm struggling to do it, my communication isn't there. And we see the game a different way and I want to leave after Stage 1”. I didn’t want to put him through a whole Stage and I didn’t want to sacrifice our Stage either by playing with someone that we know doesn't want to be there so that's why it was such a quick turnaround.

A Big setback

The time spent integrating ComeBack and building compositions around him has now set Heretics back in their search for a team identity. While other teams are finding their groove, Heretics are back to square one, this time with a rookie who has never played on stage.

Some fans may wonder why the change didn’t happen after VALORANT Champions Tour 2026 - EMEA Kickoff, but neilzinho felt that the event didn’t reflect the team’s true potential. Due to Enes "RieNs" Ecirli’ military service during the offseason, the full roster only had two weeks of practice together. Removing ComeBack at that point would have been unfair.

But again, we knew that we're suffering from just a mistake that we made in off-season when we picked him up. I do think he's a very talented player, he's got a huge future in the game. I don't regret giving him the chance, but it's just a mistake.

New recruit Koshmaras

Their new addition is Lithuanian player Koshmaras, who is completely new to Tier 1 and previously played mostly Neon. Since Heretics built most of their compositions around ComeBack, Koshmaras had to step in and fill that role immediately against Liquid.

Once Heretics knew ComeBack was leaving, they held trials, and Koshmaras stood out the most.

We saw a lot of promise in someone so young and with little experience that we can help play around his strengths. I think that's something that over the last two years we've done really well with rookies, like we know how we can get the best out of them and that's for sure something we'll do.

With no language barrier, neilzinho has already noticed improvements in communication. Koshmaras speaking English opens the door to more flexibility in compositions and greater freedom for the players.

Wo0t on Duelist

Another change is Mert "Wo0t" Alkan stepping into the primary Duelist role. It’s something he’s wanted for a while, but according to neilzinho, wasn’t ready for until now.

We gave him the chance in off-season to play Duelist, and he wasn't comfortable enough with it yet. But he came to us again when we were searching for a new player for ComeBack and he said like I'm ready, I want to do it.

Koshmaras’ addition also expands the team’s compositional options. With ComeBack, communication issues made double-Duelist comps difficult to run, so he often played a more independent role on Chamber. With Koshmaras’ background on Neon, we could see Heretics lean into more aggressive double-Duelist setups.

I can't leak you all the strats, you know. It's definitely something that we've done in the past. We've done it with MiniBoo and yeah, the reason why we pick someone up that can play Duelist as well as Chamber was so that it gives us that option we didn't have with ComeBack.

Long way back

With three matches left in the group stage, Heretics will need to win all of them to secure a playoff spot. However, there are still many issues to address. With a new player in the lineup, they are currently behind teams that have already established their identity.

At the same time, this sudden roster move gives them a chance to fix their problems before the season slips away.

We will play around it basically, Koshmaras and Wo0t, and basically just making the team comfortable again and getting them communicating together and having fun. I think they've had a rough couple of months and the main focus is just going to be the next game.

For more VCT news and interviews, stay tuned to THESPIKE.GG.

Featured image source: THESPIKE.GG