Dota 2's post-TI shuffle reshapes the top tier as Falcons exit and Topson returns to OG

Falcons walk away from Dota

The biggest shock of the post-International 2026 window was not a transfer but a departure. Team Falcons announced in early September that they were leaving competitive Dota 2 after about three years, according to roster trackers at GosuGamers and rdy.gg. GosuGamers frames the Falcons five as one of the most successful lineups the game has seen, a squad that had won multiple tier-one titles including The International 2025.

The exit rippled outward. Coach Kurtis 'Aui_2000' Ling, who guided Falcons to that TI 2025 crown, announced his retirement, closing out a career that stretched back more than a decade. With the roster released as free agents, several of the game's best players hit the market at once, and the shuffle accelerated from there.

OG bring back Topson

OG made the headline signing. On 23 September the org brought back Topias 'Topson' Taavitsainen, the two-time International winner, almost five years after he last played under the OG banner, per GosuGamers. He headlines a fresh international roster that the tracker lists alongside players including Valery 'SSS' Lazarev, Ivan 'OneJey' Zhivitsky, John Anthony 'Natsumi-' Vargas and Rolen 'Skem' Ong.

It is a clean-slate rebuild. Earlier in the month OG had released several players, so the Topson move reads less like a patch and more like a reset around a marquee name as the 2026-2027 season approaches.

Western Europe and the CIS scene rebuild

The free-agent wave reshaped several rosters. Aurora Gaming signed carry Oliver 'Skiter' Lepko on 16 September, per GosuGamers, adding one of the best-regarded position-one players available after Falcons stepped away. Team Liquid, meanwhile, ran a longer reshuffle, parting with carry Marcus 'Ace' Hoelgaard on 13 September and then midlaner Michal 'Nisha' Jankowski on 28 September.

The CIS and international scenes moved too. GosuGamers reports BetBoom restructured on 14 September, shifting Vitalie 'Save-' Melnic from support into the mid lane and bringing in a new position-four player. Team Yandex, meanwhile, benched Dmitry 'DM' Dorokhin and added Ammar 'ATF' Al-Assaf on 17 September.

Even the reigning International champions were not still. GosuGamers logged Team Spirit rotating in stand-ins around 21 September, with Magomed 'Collapse' Khalilov and coach Yaroslav 'Miposhka' Naidenov taking breaks after another deep run. It is the kind of managed rest that title-winning rosters increasingly build into a long season.

New rosters take shape

The rebuild also spun up fresh line-ups. Roster trackers logged LGD assembling a new international core that includes Syed 'SumaiL' Hassan and Jonathan 'Sneyking' Bryle, with SumaiL having earlier signalled that TI 2026 would be his last event with his previous team. Xtreme Gaming, per GosuGamers, rebuilt around Wang 'Ame' Chunyu, bringing back Xm and XinQ.

There were brand-new organisations too. Rdy.gg reports a project called Conventus Stellarum forming on 18 September around Kuro 'KuroKy' Salehi Takhasomi and a group of former Nigma Galaxy players, set to debut at PGL Wallachia Season 9. Not every legacy name survived the reset: Vici Gaming disbanded immediately after The International, per rdy.gg.

Some of the moves are confirmed and some remain reported rumours as organisations negotiate. Gaming Trend Wire is listing only the changes documented by the cited trackers, with the date each was recorded, and will update as more signings are made official.