Vincent "Freekje" Vanloo

Vincent has been around the CS:S scene since it began and is a well known and established personality in the BENELUX scene.

Although effectively retired, Vincent utilises a lot of his time fulfilling his role as an admin for CS:S helping to run tournaments for E-sports Heaven and has been integral to the smooth running of all competitions so far.

"Ah yes, finally some action! April was an action packed source month with a 20,000 euro cherry ontop. There were several teams I wanted to see perform and some did, some didn't. Let's start with my all time favorites at lan, the Germans: They came, they saw & failed, again. Of course getting knocked out on a tie with Reason isn't as disgracefull as say my next subject, the Brazilians: Some have a CSS history from the CGS times, so everyone was expecting at least some good results and I would also have predicted a fairly better result then being a round away from being 16-0'ed, TWICE.

The Danes did what probably no other country in the source community could do, keep so many international teams out of the top8, props for them. The Fins on the other hand have been very queit the last months, never the less, WINland always delivers. That leaves us everyones favorites, the French: If they would have sent a team in the likes of LDLC or 3DMAX to I-series they would have probably took home all 3 big lans this month. At Gamers Assembly we saw Sypher take the victory and this is where the Germans should take note - it is possible to perform well at LAN despite being onliners! But let us not forget the biggest news of the month! Our beloved cadred member Ritch won an I-series."

Richard Lewis

Richard comes from a journalistic background and has covered e-sports in print, on radio and television having worked for such organisations as GotFrag and CGS. He is the current content manager of Cadred where he contributes a weekly e-sports column. He was last year’s captain of Team UK in the ClanBase Nations Cup, although now he retired from playing.

He now concentrates on writing. Over the years he worked for Zboard, xciteuk, Infused and 4kings. These days he chooses to solely focus on his writing within the gaming industry.

"The heavy amount of LANs over April probably tell us where everyone belongs as accurately as anything that's happened lately. VeryGames are still at the top, Reason and mTw still seem on downward trajectories, the French and Danish scenes seem to be the only scenes that consistently produce solid teams and CKRAS are still a firm second place to the French masters.

Epsilon will be disappointed they didn't follow up 30P with an i-series win but the fact that there was a team capable of competing with them is good news for the floundering UK scene. If Fragmasters can do what they never have and actually hold a stable team we might see two genuine contenders from the UK again. Don't hold your breath though.

XAYA are the current Danish kings but the Danish scene has produced some great line-ups of late. Credit has to go to the youngsters of Speedgaming who handled themselves admirably at Copnehagen Games and seem to go from strength to strength despite their negative reputations."

Emmanuel "Wave" Meunier

The latest addition to our news team brings with him an in depth knowledge of CS:S and 1.6, especially in his native France. His work covering French EPS has been integral to the continued development of the site.

He also joked that having a French person on the panel might ensure less arguments about the top ten in future, although somehow we doubt that very much.

"Last cadred top 10 podium is confirmed in this month of May after Copenhagen Games. VeryGames are back where we are used to see them and CKRAS continue their serie of podiums. For 3DMAX they have proven that Maxlan wasn't just a great feat even tough their story is already finished. Something that will not happen to a team like XAYA who have shown consistency and progression, this for a few months now.

Some others had hardest positions to deal with this month. I'm thinking about that group of death in Copenhagen which involved Xaya, mTw, Reason and alchemists, and have been the source of many talks and decisions. Finally we saw some big names give the best of themselves for playoffs spots, something that rarely happen. In therm of entertainment and competitively we surely reached something he have not seen for a while on CS:S.

FmTOXIC and Sypher dominated their national events and as the rest of the top 10 contenders were sprayed in their respective countries, the big LAN week-end finally showed the resources that can deploy the Source community."

Mike "Rickeh" McGhee

As the new features editor, Mike brings with him an in depth knowledge of the European scene and not just those usual suspects that everyone can claim to know about. Having started plying his trade as a news contributer, he is now part of the management team here at Cadred and contributes regularly with features.

"I didn't get the chance to see VeryGames in action at the CPH Games as I was occupied with the goings on back on home turf, however it's clear from the results and the manner in which they won that they are in no mood to be messed with. I feel a little bit bad for CKRAS as they are hitting their peak at a time when a truly magnificent team are also doing the same, they are like Andy Murray struggling to keep up with the mighty Federer or Nadal. Still, they are a special team and if it wasn't for VeryGames they would be the best side around at the moment.

It's good to see some British teams actually show some potential now as well. It's been quite some time since we had a few stable teams to boast about, but from the post-LAN conversations it seems like both Epsilon and Toxic are committed to breaking into the top 3 in Europe, something that's entirely possible given the quality of their rosters.

Denmark continues to produce incredible teams and players, yet they continually seem to break up before they reach their full potential - point in question, Reason Gaming. The side have now lost their best player to the up and coming Wolves team, whether they can find a replacement for the superstar remains to be seen, I sure hope they can as they do have the potential to be very good, along with XAYA and Wolves.

Next month will be quiet and teams will have a chance to take stock of what's happened and decide where to go from here, although it seems unlikely anyone will be able to overcome VeryGames."

Ben "ben0" Balcombe

The veteran CS:S player joins the panel this month with a view to a long term move.

Having captained the former Zboard line-up Ben is no stranger to punditry having been the creator of Source Junky's UK top ten, including a strange mathematical system that only he knows and now subsequently can't remember due to brain cell loss.

Having been around since 2004 Ben did take a break from the scene but has returned with great interest.

"Just when I thought following CS:S without wanting to kill someone couldn't be more difficult, my "old friend" goes and wins an i-series. Congratulations to ritch and company, they deserve it after all of the hard work they put in. I mean, it took me a while too before I won my first, then second, then third i-series, so I know how difficult it can be... It's just a shame that my actual old friend George 'hudzG' Hoskins couldn't do the same thing out in Denmark as he continues to out-perform the rest of his team whilst a certain German contingent let the side down.

I didn't really catch much of the action at the Copenhagen Games but from what I did see VeryGames are still the best team in the world, I heard they lost to those other French guys at MaxLAN and found it pretty hard to believe, I guess it was just a minor blip and it will take something special to ever beat that team again - permitting they don't grow tired of the game.

I think we have a few months break from all of the action now and it will give the teams who disappointed (Dignitas I'm looking at you!) a chance to sort themselves out before the next run of events come along, lets just hope the scene doesn't implode like it always seems to."

The Top 10 will continue at the start of May with the next installment.