ISSAA ends his playing career and moves into coaching

Former rifler for HellRaisers and OG, the Jordanian player Issa "ISSAA" Murad has decided to hang up the mouse. He is ending his appearances on the professional Counter-Strike scene and plans to work as a coach — as an assistant, analyst, or head coach.

According to him, this is one of the most difficult decisions of his life: for many years the game was at the center of everything. In recent months he has honestly evaluated where he can bring the most value, recalling the pressure on stage, role changes, and the periods when he was the IGL and was leading the team.

ISSAA says that what motivates him most now is building a team and developing players. He is confident that he understands young players better — how confidence breaks and grows, when harsh criticism is needed and when support is needed, because he has gone through it himself.

Over the course of his career he played at three Majors and earned an MVP award at DreamHack Open Tours 2018. His star rose in HellRaisers alongside Tomáš "oskar" Šťastný and Kyrylo "ANGE1" Karasiow, and in 2019 he became one of the first players of the new OG CS lineup.

After the start of the pandemic, his career stalled: in 2021 he was benched because he was playing online from Jordan. He then switched to VALORANT while finishing university, and in 2023 he returned to CS with JiJieHao. Now his goal as a coach is to achieve what he did not manage to as a player: to compete for the biggest trophies, including a Major.