For the third time in history, Mathieu "ZywOo" Herbaut can call himself the best Counter-Strike player on the planet. To no surprise for anyone, ZywOo took down the award after a superb 2023, where he and Team Vitality won the Blast.tv Paris Major alongside IEM Rio, Gamers8, BLAST Fall Final, and BLAST World Final. Mathieu "ZywOo" Herbaut won five MVP medals to underline his contribution to the incredible year. 

With the win ZywOo equalizes Oleksandr "s1mple" Kostyljev record for three HLTV Best player of the year awards. 

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In second place Nikola "NiKo" Kovač picked up his best placement since 2017. The G2 rifler won IEM Katowice and IEM Cologne and sported a 1.20 rating this year.

In third Robin "ropz" Kool took a big jump up compared to his best year in 2019, where the Estonian was ranked 7th.

6. {cflag:ES} Álvaro "SunPayus" García 

7. {cflag:UA} Oleksandr "⁠s1mple"⁠ Kostyliev 

10. {cflag:LV} Helvijs "⁠broky⁠" Saukants 

12. {cflag:SK} David "frozen" Čerňanský 

13. {cflag:BA} Nemanja "huNter-⁠" Kovač 

15. {cflag:DK} Jakob "⁠jabbi⁠" Nygaard 

18. {cflag:DK} Casper ⁠"cadiaN"⁠ Møller 

20. {cflag:CA} Russel ⁠"Twistzz"⁠ Van Dulken

You can see the players ranked 20-30th in the tweet below.

ZywOo

NiKo

ropz

It’s been a perfect start to CS2 for FaZe. The star-studded roster won their third event in a row with a 2-0 win against MOUZ at the CS Asia Championships 2023 yesterday. The victory brings FaZe up to a 15-match win streak. Their only defeat in CS2 came in their very first match at IEM Sydney against GamerLegion. Since then, FaZe has been unstoppable.

In China, the Grand Final was a rematch of the Group B final. But unlike their first encounter of the tournament, FaZe quickly ended MOUZ’s hope of a tournament victory by winning the map pick of MOUZ. Mirage was dealt with in a quick fashion winning 13-7 before things got a little more complicated on Nuke. But with a good second half, FaZe gave themselves the chance of winning the map and match in overtime. At the third overtime series, FaZe finally broke MOUZ and could celebrate winning their third event in a row after winning IEM Sydney (LAN), Thunderpick World Championships (online), and now CS Asia Championships 2023 (LAN).

With the $250,000 win, FaZe has now racked up $600,000 in tournament winnings in CS2 alone.

Next week FaZe can add $200,000 on top of that if they are able to win the BLAST Premier Fall Finals in Copenhagen that are set to start on the 22nd of November.

The MVP of CS Asia Championships 2023 was handed to Robin "ropz" Kool. The Estonian was also named MVP at the Thunderpick World Championships.

FaZe

The semifinalists at IEM Sydney have been found after the two quarter-finals were played early Friday morning at the Aware Super Theatre.

A loud crowd made the first CS2 matches in history in an arena an exciting experience.

First, it was BetBoom versus Complexity. The NA roster quickly won their own map pick of Anubis before they won a thriller map on Ancient 13-11. Ricky 'floppy' Kemery was the man of the hour on the server, where he finished the match with a respectable 1.51 rating. After the match, the smile of Jonathan "EliGE" Jablonowski in the post-match interview left no doubt, that the players on Complexity are enjoying the recent good form, that they have taken with them into CS2.

The smiles on the players of FaZe were also big after their match against ENCE. After having lost three times to ENCE during 2023 it was time for revenge. The superduo of Russel 'Twistzz' Van Dulken and Robin "ropz" Kool completely annihilated ENCE on the server. 13-5, 13-0 was the scoreline after the humiliation was done and dusted.

The two teams will be back in the arena tomorrow morning, where the semi-finals of IEM Sydney are played.

Twistzz

MOUZ and G2 both secured themselves a day off on Friday with their group final wins against BetBoom and ENCE in the group phase of IEM Sydney.

The two teams can instead join the rest of us as spectators to the two quarter-finals, where especially one of the matches stands out.

ENCE versus FaZe is usually a match worth seeing. ENCE has the upper hand with three victories in 2023 against Finn "karrigan" Andersen and his men. The last match between the two ended in a dramatic win for ENCE, who had to endure FIVE overtime series to win the semi-final at IEM Dallas. Will we get another brawl in Sydney?

The winner of the match will face MOUZ in the semi-final.

In the other quarter-final, we have BetBoom against Complexity. The Russians from BetBoom has shown great quality in Sydney with wins against Vitality and GamerLegion before losing the group final to MOUZ. Complexity is another team in good shape with only one defeat in their last seven matches. Both Michael "Grim" Wince and Jonathan "EliGE" Jablonowski has been performing at a high level in the tournament so far, and will have to tame BetBoom’s Aleksandr "KaiR0N-" Anashkin, if they want to succeed in the matchup.

The winner will face G2 in the semi-final.

The matches will be live on Friday morning from 07.30 (CEST).

ENCE

With the launch of CS2 a lot of players are trying to find out the best possible setting for the advanced video setting.

If you have a top-tier computer, perhaps it could be a good idea to see what the professionals are doing. If you don't have a state-of-the-art setup, then it would perhaps be a good idea to check out the article below.

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On Twitter the user ThourCS has asked 25 pros about their current video settings. s1mple, ropz, Spinx, and many other well-known professionals have answered him. ThourCS has compiled a list of the most used settings among them here. 

- Global Shadow: High - Model/Texture: Low 

- Texture Filtering: Bilinear - Shader Detail: Low 

s1mple

Spinx

FaZe Clan's rifler, Robin "ropz" Kool, has been named the MVP of the ESL Pro League Season 17. His outstanding performance throughout the tournament, especially in the grand final against Cloud9, earned him the award. This is the third MVP award for ropz, with the previous two being in ESL Pro League Season 10 and 15. His consistently high level of play and impressive statistics make him one of the top players in the world of Counter-Strike.

Despite being tied for the second-highest rating of 1.27 with Sergey "Ax1Le" Rykhtorov, ropz stood out with his impactful play across all the 18 maps he and FaZe played during the tournament. He also led his team with a 1.28 rating in the grand final where FaZe managed to take down Cloud9 in a 3-1 victory. ropz recorded a 1.24 impact rating, 0.77 KPR, 0.56 DPR, and 83.4 ADR. 

Only three teams have managed to complete the Intel Grand Slam and with FaZe taking down Cloud9 they join Astralis, Team Liquid, and NAVI on the list of legendary CS:GO teams.

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2022 has been an insane year with impressive highlights from every tournament. Pro plays that shocked the world and the CS:GO community. 

Ropz made an intense play doing the first map of the IEM Katowice 2022 final against G2. The scoreline was 14-15 in favor of G2 when Ropz took things into his own hands. The Estonian rifler took down all five players from G2 to secure overtime. FaZe ended up winning the map and the tournament.

Watch the best plays from pro players in 2022 right here:

We look back at the last big event of the year, where some of CS:GO biggest stars went head to head for the $500.000 in first prize.

In the Grand Final, it was G2 who lifted the trophy. The star-studded roster also had four of five players in the top 8 best-performing players at the tournament. You can see the top 10 list here.

Highest-rated players at BLAST World Finals 2022:

m0NESY

degster

huNter

k0nfig

EliGE

BLAST will once again honor the best CS:GO players and coaches by selecting the 2022 Team of the Year.

Taking part in the vote is a diverse selection of experts consisting of journalists, broadcast talent, and other respected voices from the world of Counter-Strike. We here at Pley.gg are among those who have been asked to nominate players and coaches within six different categories.

Coach of the Year: Andrii "B1ad3" Horodenskyi

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Support of the Year: Ilya "Perfecto" Zalutskiy

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Lurker of the Year: Robin “ropz” Kool

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Entry of the Year: Mareks "YEKINDAR" Gaļinskis

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IGL of the Year: Finn "karrigan" Andersen

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AWP of the Year: Oleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev

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karrigan

YEKINDAR

Perfecto

The playoffs start today at BLAST World Finals after each team has played two matches in the group stage.

Here FaZe and OG came out on top, and are directly qualified for the Semi-Finals, while G2, Vitality, Liquid, and NAVI will fight later today for the last two spots.

You can see who is leading the rankings at the event here.

You can bet on BLAST World Finals via our betting partners below.

G2 Esports

Team Vitality

{cflag:EE} Robin “ropz” Kool (FaZe) - 1.14 rating in 2022 

ropz has been an important part of the huge year for FaZe. The Estonian joined the team in January and quickly proved to be the last part of the puzzle to elevate FaZe to a championship team. ropz has been one of the most consistent players all year around. 

{cflag:DK} Benjamin "blameF" Bremer (Astralis) - 1.24 rating in 2022

blameF has been one of the bright spots on a struggling Astralis roster. The Dane has consistently been the top-fragger for Astralis, and has at least statistically been one of the best players in the world in 2022. 

{cflag:IL} Lotan "Spinx" Giladi (ENCE/Team Vitality) - 1.11 rating in 2022

As one of the biggest revelations of 2022, it quickly became obvious to everybody, that ENCE would have difficulties keeping Spinx on the team with Team Vitality knocking on the door. The 22-year-old would probably be among the favorites for the award if he had kept up the impressive performances from the start of the year. But during the Rio RMR and at the Major the Israelian had problems finding his feet on his new team.

{cflag:BR} Kaike "KSCERATO" Cerato (FURIA) - 1.17 rating in 2022

The FURIA lurker nearly made every Brazilian dream come true with a deep run at IEM Rio. KSCERATO rarely plays badly at events, and topped his performances with an impressive showing at IEM Rio.

{cflag:BA} Nemanja "huNter-" Kovač (G2) - 1.12 rating in 2022

Despite a troublesome year for G2 huNter- has shown consistency. The Bosnian has not had one event under a 1.00 HLTV rating all year long. Since the addition of Justin "jks" Savage on the team, huNter- is moving more and more away from the lurker role, so maybe he should be placed in a new category next year. 

blameF

KSCERATO

Astralis

FURIA

The number #1 ropz fan and fellow citizen uses the famous silent jump to take down four players of the enemy team. Despite being half hp and down four men, kapuzz surprises the opponent and takes the round win after hitting some crips headshots. 

Normally, the CTs are peeking from close stairs to get info on A ramp Mirage, or standing under "wood" to hear if any noise is coming from A ramp. From now on you can never be sure after Ropz has learned the CS:GO community how to do the drop without making any noise. 

The world class FaZe player used the drop to surprise F1KU who had no idea that ropz dropped down from the high ground near the A ramp on Mirage.  

Watch ropz do the silent play right here against OG:

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Scope.gg has once again revealed some fascinating facts from the BLAST Premier Fall Final event in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Heroic’s stavn got the highest number of wallbang kills throughout the event. A total of 15, as well as 17 kills through smokes. Should his PC be checked to see if there’s any ‘third party software’ running?

FaZe Clan’s ropz became the most accurate rifler of the event with an accuracy of 59.3%.

NiP’s REZ was the fastest sniper of the tournament with TTD (Time to Damage) of 199 ms. Meanwhile, s1mple was the slowest with TTD of 237 ms. TTD is basically the average time it took you from seeing the enemy player to dealing damage to them.

Heroic’s newest addition to the roster, jabbi, admired his skins for 47 minutes! Some players just can’t get enough of looking at their skins.

Aleksib died 13 times with a grenade in his hand or while reloading. For you guys out there, don’t let you self be caught off guard!

Aleksib

Jabbi

stavn

Helvijs "broky" Saukants and FaZe came short at the very end of Mirage, where the star-studded roster lost to Heroic in overtime.

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The Latvian finished the event with an impressive 1.29 rating, which was enough to secure him the MVP award for the tournament.

Helvijs "broky" Saukants was also awarded the MVP medal at IEM Katowice at the start of the year.

The Latvian fought off two other Baltic players at the top of the ratings of the event.

Highest-rated players at BLAST Fall Finals:

broky

Heroic has done, what Astralis did not manage to do during their prime. To win a big trophy in the Royal Arena in Copenhagen. And they did it against the best team in 2022.

FaZe had set their eyes on the trophy in Copenhagen to be their bounce back after a troublesome second half of the year. On Overpass it started well for FaZe, who went 5-0 up on their CT side. But then Heroic fought their way back in a low buy round and crushed the defense of FaZe. Heroic actually won the first half as T-side, which set themselves up to win the map in a convincing fashion. Captain cadiaN lead the pack, while the lack of firepower from the perhaps most consistent FaZe player Russel 'Twistzz' Van Dulken was missing.

With five straight defeats on Inferno (three of them at BLAST Fall Finals), there were no real expectations toward Heroic finishing off FaZe here. The Danes won the first half 8-7.

FaZe have been incredible on their CT side during the event. Could they once again bounce back? Heroic did their best to finish the match on Inferno, but several times during the second half, they lost rounds they should not have. The Desert Eagle from rain will probably give them nightmares tonight, while the brilliant timings from ropz set FaZe up for a map win on Inferno.

Mirage was set as the decider. Here it was Heroic who came out strong. On their CT side the Danes harvested the energy from the Royal Arena and put up an excellent half. For FaZe it was again broky and ropz keeping them in the match, while karrigan, rain, and Twistzz had a difficult first half. Heroic was 11-4 ahead before the final half of BLAST Fall Finals. During the half, Vitality’s coach, Danny "zonic" Sørensen was filmed in the audience. Would zonic’s law come into effect today?

FaZe gave it a shot. They took it from 4-11 to 9-11 before Heroic found a round. From here on everybody was on the edge of their seats. In a thriller ending it was only fitting, that the match went to overtime. Here Heroic won two rounds on their T side, which again gave them the upper hand. At 19-16, the Royal Arena erupted as Heroic broke the curse and became the first Danish team to win on home turf. They take $200.000 with them and the BLAST trophy.

[twitchClip:WrongRockyOctopusSoonerLater-pib7UCa4Aa3AdUMm]

Both teams will fight again at the BLAST World Finals next month.

FaZe – Heroic 1-2| BLAST Premier Fall Finals

11-16 (Overpass) {cflag:DK} cadiaN – 1.39 Rating / 24-13 K-D / 94.6 ADR

16-12 (Inferno) | {cflag:EE} ropz – 1.50 Rating / 27-18 K-D / 107.2 ADR

16-19 (Mirage) | {cflag:DK} stavn – 1.54 Rating / 25-11 K-D / 91.1 ADR

cadiaN

Heroic

The Estonian won key rounds for FaZe on Nuke to allow the star-studded roster to fight their way back into the match.

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We caught up with the man of the hour for FaZe, Robin "ropz" Kool after their match against Ninjas in Pyjamas in the Semi-Final of BLAST Fall Finals. 

Ninjas in Pyjamas is perhaps the hardest team to predict in modern Counter-Strike. The Swedish Ninjas are constantly performing against the odds, and today they did it again.

Against FaZe in the Semi-Finals at BLAST Fall Finals in front of a packed Royal Arena, NIP proved, that they can beat the best, but also melt down when least expected.

The match got kickstarted by in-game leader Aleksi 'Aleksib' Virolainen, who not only called a superb map but also came through individually with a huge performance on Overpass. NIP won seven T rounds on the CT heavy map, and got the job done in the second half with a stellar CT side winning 16-11.

FaZe had picked Nuke as the second map of the match. At 6-1 up everything looked according to plan, but then NIP won all of the remaining eight rounds of the half to take the lead 9-6. Royal Arena went quiet, as the desperation of the faces of rain, broky, and Twistzz started to tell the story of another downfall of the tournament favorites, who has had a nightmarish second half of the season after winning everything in the first six months of the year.

Robin "ropz" Kool was the only player that gave NIP problems. The Estonian kept FaZe in the match at 7-14 down and helped his team initiate a last-minute comeback. FaZe made it all the way back to 14-14 before NIP finally broke the streak. In the 30th and final round, NIP had a 5vs3 situation to seal the match, but once again it was ropz standing tall on the B-site to deny NIP the victory in regulation. In overtime, FaZe had regained enough composure to seal their map. So Mirage had to come into use as the decider map.

Here FaZe was clearly the better team, and what could have been a huge upset win for NIP turned into a story about missed chances. The Swedish Ninjas had every opportunity to close the match out on Nuke, but will instead have to watch the Grand Final from a distance, as FaZe won Mirage and the match.

FaZe will now face Heroic in the Grand Final tomorrow at the Royal Arena in Copenhagen.

FaZe – Ninjas in Pyjamas 2-1| BLAST Premier Fall Finals

11-16 (Overpass) {cflag:FI} Aleksib – 1.36 Rating / 23-13 K-D / 87.2 ADR

19-17 (Nuke) | {cflag:EE} ropz – 1.42 Rating / 33-19 K-D / 91.6 ADR

16-8 (Nuke) | {cflag:LV} broky – 1.54 Rating / 25-11 K-D / 91.1 ADR

MVP: {cflag:LV} Helvijs "broky" Saukants - 1.30 Rating / 74-51 K-D / 84.1 ADR

Ninjas in Pyjamas

Today, at the BLAST Premier Fall Finals event in Copenhagen, Denmark, FaZe Clan took down OG in their opening match to advance to the upper final of the event.

After dominating OG out of the server with a 16-3 scoreline on Ancient, the series moved to FaZe’s pick of Mirage where karrigan’s troops once again secured a comfortable victory (16-6) to put an end to the match.

On Mirage, we saw FaZe’s Estonian superstar, Robin “ropz” Kool pull off a rather unusual sneaky drop close to A-ramp, which left OG’s F1KU completely confused before getting killed. His sneaky silent drop near the A ramp caught F1KU off guard as he didn’t hear a single noise and got killed with a grenade in his hand while jiggle peeking ramp to see if anyone would cross.

The Estonian’s kill on F1KU helped FaZe Clan secure their first round on the map and give them the confidence to start putting pressure on OG’s defense and their economy as well.

[twitchClip:DeliciousVastNarwhalPermaSmug-7ZpexGUXkCVhNEBJ]

F1KU

In what can only be described as a disaster for FaZe Clan, karrigan and company got eliminated from the IEM Rio Major with a 0-3 record in the group stage, even though the roster was one of the biggest favorites to win the entire tournament.

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FaZe was dealt the killing blow by the underdogs from Kosovo, Bad News Eagles, who not just handed FaZe the worst placement of any defending Major champion squad, but also shocked the entire Counter-Strike world by eliminating one of the best teams in the world without an organization behind them.

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IEM Rio Major 2022 was a huge failure for FaZe, considering the fact that karrigan and company had already won the three biggest tournaments so far this year. What went wrong for FaZe?

Find out right here as NaToSaphiX takes a deep dive into their monumental failure in Rio:

rain

Bad News Eagles

World Cup in football is coming up starting only ten days from now. On that occasion, we thought we would ask some of the most profiled CS:GO players about which countries would have the best national team.

Emil “Magisk” Reif, Nikola “NiKo” Kovac and Robin “ropz” Kool all offered their opinion earlier this year when we spoke to the superstar trio, where they also touched on whether CS:GO should have a World Cup or not.

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Here are their answers on which countries would have the best national team.

“That’s a tough one. I think Denmark would have the best national team. I mean we have so many players, and I think we have so many top-tier players. Denmark or Ukraine, I would say. It’s between these two. Ukraine has great players like s1mple and b1t, so they have crazy players as well”

"I think it’s hard to guess who would have the best national team. I think there are plenty of countries that could make a strong team. Even for the Bosnian scene, which is pretty small, we could create a pretty strong team right now.

It’s all about how the teams fit together because I think every national team would be on a very similar level when it comes to the different players. It will come down to communication, how the team is feeling together, if players are happy with each other, and if they are willing to play. That’s a super important feeling for the team if you were to create a national team."

“Denmark is up there for sure. I mean they have so much talent and so much experience – they have the whole package. I guess Brazil as well. They are quite similar to Denmark. Maybe Ukraine as well, just because of the fact that s1mple is from there. You know, you can always put together a mix around him. I think he’s done that a few times already.

The renowned caster and analyst, Janko "YNk" Paunović has made a comprehensive thread on Twitter, where he gives his take on the best five-man starting lineup for a large number of countries. Give it a look down below and see if you agree with YNk. 

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ropz

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