Team Liquid Dota 2 player Aydin "INSaNiA" Sarkohi is considering retirement. In interview with BLAST, he revealed that he might end his career after the end of the current season. He wants to focus on other things in life, which is hard for a professional player.
I want to keep playing. It's not impossible, especially as a position 5, to keep playing into your 30s. It's just about shifting my priorities. I've been a pro player for like 15 years now, so there are other things in life I want to do, and that becomes very difficult with how much we travel.
Therefore, retirement is on my mind because I want to explore other options I want to do in the future.<...> I think there's a chance of my retiring, even if I don't win [TI14 and EWC], but it's not certain as of now. We’ll cross that bridge once we get there.
The captain of Team Liquid confessed that he started to play more relaxed. The team also have been saving energy for the biggest events of the season, but they plan to put maximum effort now.
If anything, winning TI has made us a little bit more relaxed. I don't believe it's adding any pressure; rather, it’s taking the pressure off. As for our performance, everyone is confident that we will perform to our potential even if we have some bad tournaments, so it doesn't really matter.
Moreover, we tend to ramp up as the year goes on to avoid burnout by the time Riyadh and TI come around. So we take it slow and don’t really worry about the results. But now, we are going to start ramping up, and that means playing more and tapping into our maximum ability, and focusing on our promise to become a better version of ourselves.
INSaNiA debuted in Heroes of Newerth, playing with his friends KheZu and zai. He was one of the last professionals to switch to Dota 2 in 2015. He has been competing with miCKe for almost his entire career in this game. Together they won several events, and reached numerous 2nd places. In 2024, Liquid finally won The International.
