Today we’re looking at Patrick ‘f0rest’ Lindberg, a man that brought greatness to both Fnatic and Ninjas in Pyjamas and seemed to be unbeatable to many.
Despite having won just a single Major, our Legend of today is seen as one of the best players of all time. Having a lengthy career spanning from early on in the Counter-Strike 1.6 era up till now, you could say being good at Counter-Strike has been his life’s work. The rise of f0rest seemingly came out of nowhere. With him and Begrip Gaming playing at WEG 2005 S02, people did not see him as a title contender. Yet to the surprise of many he did manage to win, meaning some big teams would have their eyes on him to see if he could fill up some weaknesses in their roster.
Fnatic f0rest
Just over half a year later, f0rest was picked up by Fnatic whilst they were building a strong roster. They instantly started performing well at international LANs, winning some but often being just shy of coming out on top at the highest tier events. As the year progressed, they were able to grow stronger and actually win CPL Singapore and Winter, with f0rest also taking the title at the European Nations Champions 2006. This great performance with Fnatic kept on going through 2007 as well, taking home many more trophies and big titles.
Yet despite all successes f0rest had with Fnatic, he would leave the organisation in 2010, after almost four years together. Going over to SK Gaming together with Christopher ‘GeT_RiGht’ Alesund, who would become a long term teammate, it would mean a new adventure with a new line-up. It seemed as if every team f0rest would touch, turned into gold. Taking quite some more big titles with his new organisation and team. There was another Counter-Strike iteration looming on the horizon and despite all the successes now also gained with SK Gaming, f0rest took an opportunity to go for something new at the legendary organisation Ninjas in Pyjamas.
Globally unbeatable
With the new Counter-Strike: Global Offensive also came a new and unbeaten record that is still almost too good to be true. NiP was unbeaten for 87 maps straight on LAN, winning almost every tournament the team would play in for the first half of CS:GO’s first year. Again it seemed as if f0rest had a golden touch, winning more than anyone could imagine a single team and player could.
Of course the streak came to an end against Virtus Pro at the StarLadder StarSeries V, but that didn’t stop f0rest from winning many more events in 2013. The first ever Major also came in 2013 and it would not be weird to imagine f0rest also winning that event, but DreamHack Winter 2013 turned into a heartbreaker, losing against his old organisation Fnatic and missing out on what could have been the first of many.
The same happened four months later at the ESL Major Series One Katowice 2014, where once more Virtus.Pro was the team to crush the dreams of f0rest and his team. Despite these struggles, f0rest and NiP were still in contention for many titles and it was certain their career could not go without that Major win
Sweet revenge
At ESL One: Cologne 2014, the next Major was within the grasp of f0rest. He would once more reach the final and would once more face his old organisation Fnatic. Yet the entire tournament f0rest and his team had troubles getting clean wins, not even topping their group. Yet with every last map they played in the bracket going to the last few rounds, NiP was able to come out on top.
With Fnatic beaten, f0rest had his revenge for that first Major that slipped through his fingers. In the following two Majors he played, f0rest unfortunately was back at second place again, both times. During the last one, he once more lost out against Fnatic. F0rest was never really close to another Major title again, sometimes winning some big events but results became more sporadic as time went by.
The endgame?
It’s time for a new dynasty. pic.twitter.com/HbAcX0T8dD
— Dignitas (@dignitas) January 21, 2020
As the performance of NiP went down, f0rest looked for a new adventure at Dignitas with his teammates of old. Usually this means a new great period looking at his previous transfers, but this time he was unable to deliver great results early on. Some roster swaps were made but he is still fighting. Maybe he will not make it to the top again, or maybe he will rise up once more as quick as he did in 1.6 and be a dominant force once again.
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