Why s1mple and ZywOo Won Again

For the past four years, two players have dominated CS:GO. One of them is Aleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev and the other is Mathiew “ZywOo” Herbaut.

S1mple won the race for the best CS:GO player of the season twice in these years, in 2022 and 2021. ZywOo won in 2019 and 2020. A quick look at their stats immediately reveals why that happened.

What Makes s1mple so Amazing

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S1mple is the definition of a complete CS:GO player. He often plays with the AWP but the truth is that he doesn’t really care about the gun. For him, it’s more about his reaction time, his ability to aim, and his deep understanding of every single position in the game.

When you play CS:GO, the goal is to always look at yourself from the opponent’s point of view and figure out how you can outsmart him. In s1mple’s case, it often feels as though he’s playing on both computers at the same time.

Any good player can excel in a few matches and win some match MVP awards. But few players can win tournament MVP awards and remain consistent month after month.

With most CS:GO players, you usually notice when they had a great match or map. In s1mple’s case, you tend to notice the exact opposite because he usually has a fantastic K-D score and an impressive rating 2.0.

In 2022, Natus Vincere didn’t do so well and only won one S-tier tournament. But they were still a top eight team at most S-tier events and that couldn’t have happened without s1mple’s performance.

What Makes ZywOo a Formidable Player

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ZywOo’s playstyle is unique. He approaches every situation in his own way and nobody understands what goes through his mind during a CS:GO match.

Most players have a textbook style, which makes them somewhat predictable. In ZywOo’s case, he seems to have a superhuman ability to be creative in every situation and figure out the optimal approach in a matter of seconds.

At the highest competitive level, CS:GO is a game that forces you to think fast and solve problems in your mind at all times. You simply cannot rely exclusively on the patterns you’ve learned because each match presents new challenges, that you haven’t encountered before.

ZywOo thrives under these conditions. The more chaotic the game becomes, the better he does. Over the past three months, he had a rating 2.0 of 1.27, 0.79 kills per round and contributed in more than 75% of the rounds. For a game like CS:GO, that’s off-the-charts.

In 2022, Team Vitality won a single S-tier tournament: ESL Pro League Season 16. But the team did well overall and would have been impossible for them to be a top 10 team without the contribution of ZywOo. Quite often, it felt like he was carrying his teammates completely on his own.

Header: ESL