The Macedonian IGL sat down with K Bizzy on the Half Time CS podcast for his first public comments since Falcons removed him from the active roster on April 20. Forty-five minutes of interview. No punches pulled.

Damjan “kyxsan” Stoilkovski told K Bizzy he learned about the move on the day he landed in Brazil for IEM Rio 2026. Same day. Same airport trip. A message from the team manager, and the tone made the outcome obvious before a single word was spoken.

“I knew it wouldn’t be a nice talk from the way he said it,” kyxsan said. “But it still came as a shock to me because, before this day, there was never a discussion in the team about making changes.”

That last part is the headline. Sixteen months building a project with NiKo, m0NESY, TeSeS, and kyousuke, one trophy at PGL Bucharest, six more grand finals, and according to kyxsan, not a single internal conversation about potential roster changes before the axe fell.

The Promise That Didn’t Hold

kyxsan framed the Falcons project as a long-term build from the start. His words to K Bizzy were blunt: “This is a project that we wanted to build long-term. It wasn’t about winning an event now. This team was promised time.”

The 25-year-old pointed to Falcons’ track record of abrupt moves. Magisk and degster both got the same treatment before him. He saw it happen to teammates, believed he was different, and then watched the same script play out with his own name in the headline.

Still, kyxsan stopped short of hostility. “There isn’t any bad blood,” he said. “I understand the decision, that we didn’t do the best this year.” He called the timing unfair, though, and he has every reason to. The bench came after the Major roster lock, leaving him no path onto another team before IEM Cologne kicks off on June 2.

karrigan’s Falcons and the Astana Result

The man who replaced him proved the org’s point and contradicted it in the same tournament. Finn “karrigan” Andersen led Falcons to the grand final of PGL Astana 2026 in his first event with the roster. The run included a clean 2-0 over magic in the semifinal and strong group stage performances from m0NESY, who posted a 1.56 rating in the opener against K27.

Then came Team Spirit in the final. A 3-0 sweep. NiKo finished with a 0.76 rating across the series. karrigan himself went 32-56 with a 0.66. The loss exposed everything the roster still needs to fix before Cologne, and it landed barely a month after the IGL swap that was supposed to fix those exact problems.

kyxsan watched from the bench. His replacement reached the final he never could at Astana, then lost it in the most one-sided way possible. The narrative writes itself, and neither side comes out clean.

What Comes Next for kyxsan

The IEM Cologne Major starts in two weeks. 32 teams, $1.25 million prize pool, playoffs at the LANXESS Arena. Falcons are in. kyxsan is not.

He told K Bizzy he wants to get back as soon as possible. No retirement talk, no extended break. The podcast also touched on community pressure and his five-year outlook, but the core message was simple: he still sees himself competing at the top level and plans to prove the bench was a mistake.

Finding the right project will be the challenge. kyxsan built Apeks from tier-two obscurity to a Paris Major semifinal in 2023. He turned HEROIC into consistent contenders. He gave Falcons their first and only CS trophy. The resume speaks for itself. The question is which organization needs a structured, tactically-minded IGL badly enough to build around one while the biggest tournament of 2026 plays out without him.