We all knew this was coming: legendary player and former International champion Aydin “Insania” Sarkohi is retiring from professional play in Dota 2. Team Liquid announced his intention to call it quits after a long and storied career at around 3AM ET today, via a post on their official X account.
Prior to his retirement, Insania had been a member of Team Liquid for six years, starting in 2019 when he first jumped ship from Alliance. As one of the oldest active professional players before hanging up the mouse and keyboard, he was one of the biggest mainstays of Western European Dota as far as the hard support role went — and his veteran experience and game sense were known throughout the entire scene.
Living for the grind
Insania actually didn’t get his start as a pro gamer with Dota 2. Rather, he began with Heroes of Newerth (HoN) back when he was around, playing with names like Maurice “KheZu” Gutmann and Ludwig “zai” Wåhlberg in a team called BlackFade. He eventually qualified for DreamHack Summer 2012, finishing in third place with BlackFade.
After 6 unforgettable years with Team Liquid, @insan1a is retiring from professional Dota 2.
His story comes full circle after lifting the Aegis at TI 2024, a moment that will always be a defining part of our team’s history. We’re so honored to be the team where he chose to… pic.twitter.com/41R8qKGPqW
— Team Liquid Dota (@teamliquiddota) October 7, 2025
He would go on to become the winningest HoN player of all time in terms of prize money, with more than $50,000 to his name in that regard. But with interest in HoN waning in the wake of the first ever International in 2011 (TI1), Insania began seeing his colleagues make the shift over to Dota 2. Despite this, he was initially resistant, sticking with HoN for much longer than most others, until eventually switching to Dota in late 2015.
Since then, he’s won over $2 million in prize money in Dota, playing for organizations like Ninjas in Pyjamas, Alliance, and most recently, Team Liquid. By the time his retirement was announced earlier today, he was 31 years old — making him the oldest player at TI14 just a month ago.
A long time coming
A huge favorite of sideline reporters and content creators like Jared “Nomad’ Bajina, Ted “PyrionFlax” Forsyth, and Jake “SirActionSlacks” Kanner when it comes to interviews, Insania had actually been alluding to retirement in interviews for quite some time now. He once said that he would play no more than another year after TI14, and that he wanted to begin focusing on being with his family and living life outside of professional gaming.
Given that his career spanned more than 10 years, it was pretty much time to say goodbye to Dota 2. Insania had already risen to the top by winning TI14 with Liquid, and he even did so with two of his HoN bros: Michael “miCKe” Vu and Samuel “Boxi” Svahn. You almost couldn’t write a more feel-good story like that when it comes to the long term, and it was amazing seeing it all come full circle at TI14.
And prior to that, Insania made himself somewhat infamous with the Gyrocopter incident at TI9, back when he was a member of Alliance. Drafting for his team at the time, he wanted to ban Gyrocopter against Royal Never Give Up in their lower bracket match, which happened to be a best-of-one.
This was all well and good, but the problem was that the timer ran out just as he was about to ban Gyrocopter, which meant that Alliance skipped their final ban without meaning to do so. The draft state then immediately gave them their final pick, but Insania didn’t notice this — and in the heat of the moment, accidentally picked Gyrocopter instead of banning him.
Definitely one of the biggest draft mistakes in International history — and one that absolutely caused Alliance to lose the game and get eliminated from TI9 early. Boxi went on to say that it was “going to be a story to tell”, but only six years later, he and Insania were lifting the Aegis of Champions at TI13. All’s well that ends well, even if it takes more than half a decade.
Solid as they come
History aside, Insania will go down as one of the best European support players to ever play the game. His dedication to his craft and ability to perform at the highest level with such consistency should serve as an example to other support players, whether professional or playing Dota just for fun.
His Oracle is downright legendary: 167 total games with the hero at the professional level makes him the most prolific Oracle player in history. He boasts a 63.47 percent win rate with the hero over that span, proving time and time again that his signature pick is one to be feared and respected.
Team Liquid as a whole saw exactly what Insania was capable of in game, and kept him on their active roster for an entire six years because of it. Their loyalty to him paid dividends at TI13 like I mentioned earlier in this article, even though it might have taken longer than most other esports organizations would have preferred.
He leaves behind a great legacy, and an indelible mark on Dota 2. Rather selfishly, I hope he transitions to a career in match analysis — but considering his desire to focus on just enjoying his life after the game, I would just be happy to see him taking full advantage of his retirement.
