G2 Esports is back in Cologne to defend their title from the 2023 edition of the tournament. The defending champions are among the eight teams directly qualified for the main tournament, while 16 teams will start their journey in Cologne at the Play-in event.

The biggest change from previous years is the removal of best-of-ones matches. The change to MR12 in CS2 has caused the tournament organizer ESL to sway away from one map matches. Now all matches will be played as best of three except the Grand Final, which will be a best of five.

 are back in Cologne and will be one of the favorites for the tournament. G2 has looked sharp after making a roster shuffle adding Janusz "Snax" Pogorzelski and Mario "malbsMd" Samayoa to the roster.

 is another team to watch at the event. Russel "Twistzz" Van Dulken has taken over the role of in-game leader on the team and will look to carry on the positive start that the new roster got in Copenhagen at the BLAST Fall qualifier. You can read more about Twistzz and his take on the new iteration of Team Liquid.

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IEM Cologne and IEM Katowice are among the most prestigious events in the calendar. 

 won Katowice back in February, and is the bookmaker's favorite for the title in Cologne as well. Can Danil "donk" Kryshkovets deliver another masterclass and lead his team to glory?

Opening round: (Wednesday, 7th August – Times in CET)

16.30: Complexity – ALTERNATE aTTaX 2-0

Opening round: (Saturday, 10th of August - Times in CET)

17.00: Natus Vincere - Vitality 1-2 (ongoing)

9-12th: $16,000 (Astralis, The MongolZ, Complexity, Falcons)

13-16th: $10,000 (Spirit, 9z, Virtus.pro, FURIA)

donk

Twistzz

G2 Esports

Team Liquid

Spirit

The North American audience will have familiar faces to cheer on at IEM Dalles at the end of May. The new iteration of Team Liquid managed to qualify for the event after a bumpy closed qualifier.

A defeat in the opening round against Nouns meant that Liquid had to go through the lower bracket to find their way to the Grand Final, where they faced off against Nouns once again.

A 13-7 and 13-9 win on Inferno and Mirage saw Liquid secure their spot at IEM Dallas. The two Canadians on the team, Russel "Twistzz" Van Dulken and Keith "NAF" Markovic ended the event as the highest-rated players, while Jeorge 'Jeorge' Endicott from Nouns was the highest-rated player in the Grand Final.

14 out of 16 teams have now been found for the Dallas event. The last two spots will be found at the closed European qualifier next month.

These teams have qualified for IEM Dallas:

Complexity, M80, Team Liquid, 9z, Grayhound, BIG, Monte, Falcons, G2, Natus Vincere, MOUZ, FaZe, Vitality, Spirit.

jeorgesnorts

Last night Team Liquid announced the last player to complete the rebuild of the roster.

Russel "Twistzz" Van Dulken returns to Team Liquid after two years at FaZe, where the 24-year-old rifler won everything worth winning including the PGL Antwerp Major, IEM Katowice 2022, IEM Cologne 2022, and the Intel Grand Slam Season 4. The success continued in CS2, where Twistzz and FaZe won the first three tournaments on the calendar.

Now the Canadian is back at Team Liquid, where he was part of another golden era in 2019, where Liquid went on an insane winning streak and claimed the Intel Grand Slam Season 2 title in just 69 days. Russel "Twistzz" Van Dulken is the only player in history to have won two Grand Slams. In the announcement video the new Liquid-rifler reveals one of his ambitions on Liquid “I’m back and want number three”, he says referring to a third Grand Slam win.

Twistzz also commented on his own Twitter profile about the move to Liquid.

- There will be more info shared but I would still like to share a bit of insight on my move to Liquid. When I started receiving offers, I realized I do want something that has longevity to it, an over all younger team. The organization has created a very strong supporting staff around this team and for me there is a lot of history within the org. I truly believe in what is being created here, I could say a lot already about each piece of this squad but to keep it short, we can't wait to show what we're working on.

Keith "NAF" Markovic is the only player from the heyday of Team Liquid who is still on the roster. The two Canadians will be part of a new Team Liquid team that will be based in the Americas region with the signing of the Brazilian rifler Felipe "skullz" Medeiros. Casper "cadiaN" Møller and Mareks "YEKINDAR" Gaļinskis are the last two remaining parts of the team, that will have some time to prepare for the 2024 season with no upcoming fixtures in December.

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.

ropz

FaZe

The community around CS:GO has multiple times shown that it is capable of achieving big things outside of the server.

Clutch Cancer is the latest initiative where Counter-Strike is being used as a platform to help other people. The man behind the initiative is Morten 'ZukwiZ' Byskov. The co-founder of GamerPay launched the initiative after his own experience of losing a family member due to the disease.

On Clutchcancer.com you can register if you want to be a part of the project. In season 1 the two chosen projects to support are "Danish Cancer Society" & "Cancer Is Not For Children".

[image:{"source":"cloudinary","publicId":"misc/ClutchCancer_ls5gmh","originalWidth":2024,"originalHeight":1012,"customWidth":"100%","customHeight":"100%","cloudinaryAssetData":true,"cloudName":"pley-gg","format":"jpg"}]

As seen in the image above there are several big names within the CS:GO community who are committed to the project. All of them have signed up to donate a fixed amount every time they get a kill with their stattrack weapon of choice. You can also sign up to support. The first season runs from the 1st of March until the 1st of June.

Here at Pley.gg we wish everyone happy fragging!

Read more on [link:{"url":"https://www.clutchcancer.com/","isNewTab":true,"text":"Clutchcancer.com"}]

dupreeh

HooXi

olofmeister

Twistzz's performance during the ESL Pro League grand final against Cloud9 was nothing but impressive. He showed exceptional skill and composure throughout the series, helping his team secure a much-needed victory. During the last map of the series, the Canadian Rifler stood tall as he singlehanded took down all five players of cloud9 to secure the map point and series point. 

A thrilling series between the Russians and the Mixed Europeans saw FaZe win their fourth tournament in little over a year to secure themselves the intel Grand slam trophy as the fourth team to ever do it.

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Watch Twistzz's impressive ace right here:

Read more about FaZe´s road to the Intel Grand Slam victory.

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The Intel Grand Slam Season 4 has been all about FaZe Clan, who early on took three big victories in the first part of 2022 to set themselves up for the $1 million prize pool and the title as Intel Grand Slam winners. Only three teams have completed the milestone in CS:GO history (Astralis, Team Liquid, and NAVI). Tomorrow FaZe will get their first shot in a Grand Final to add their name to the list of legendary CS:GO teams.

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FaZe earned their spot in the Grand Final despite losing the first map in a spectacular fashion. On Ancient it was NAVI who utterly destroyed FaZe. On their T-side NAVI blasted through the defense of FaZe with the help of Oleksandr 's1mple' Kostyliev, who looked unstoppable.

The Ukrainian carried that momentum on to Nuke, but unfortunately for him, the rest of the NAVI roster did not. NAVI had their chances, but the communication seemed to be shaky from the CIS team, who lost rounds like this one, where ropz, just equipped with a USP, was able to take down NAVI.

[twitchClip:ViscousObliviousWebRiPepperonis-rZbl7dJR4q0MhNB9]

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The hopes were high before Mirage, but the decider map never really got as close, as fans of CS perhaps would have wanted. FaZe won the last map 16-9 after strong performances from Twistzz, ropz, rain, and broky.

Now, Cloud9 awaits in the Grand Final of ESL Pro League. The match tomorrow will be played as a best-of-five match. There is $200.000 in prize for first place in the tournament, but the winner will be guaranteed to take home even more. If FaZe wins they will have $1 million dollars added to their win, while Cloud9 can add $100K for spoiling FaZe’s Grand Slam win, if they are able to win the Final tomorrow.

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The Grand Final will begin tomorrow at 16.00 (CET).

MVP: {cflag:CA} Russel 'Twistzz' Van Dulken - 1.37 rating / 64-37 K-D / 85.2 ADR

Natus Vincere

Imagine Valve as Santa Claus. Then imagine every Counter-Strike enthusiast in the world sitting home and writing their very own and personal wish list for the heavily-reported Counter-Strike update.

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Where a new matchmaking system, new maps, new weapons, and even significant changes to the in-game aspect, are some of the things being guessed and desired by our always passionate CS:GO community.

However, if you ask FaZe star rifler Russel “Twistzz” Van Dulken the changes will be nowhere as groundbreaking, he explained to ESL yesterday.

- I think people are overreacting really bad right now with Source 2. I think Source 2 will be the main update to help them mesh the maps better together. Fix texture problems or any issues. Let’s say on Overpass for example if you’re walking along the left wall on long you will get stuck. I think issues like that are the ones that will get fixed. Maybe some grenade bugs.

- It is not going to be like you open the game and you load the server and then you can see your legs or like if you press shift you will run. Like it’s not going to happen, Twistzz said. 

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Twistzz’s captain and in-game leader on FaZe, Finn “karrigan” Andersen, was also a part of the couch segment at ESL Pro League Season 17. Although he wasn’t as talkative as his teammate, karrigan still contributed to the discussion.

-To be honest, there are so many bugs in the game that are happening. So I think with a new code it’s just going to be more smooth and everything – that’s what we can expect, karrigan noted.

If you want to see the entire bit with Twistzz and karrigan then you can find it down below.

[youtube:_IcFLFf9zIg?feature=share&t=37150]

karrigan

Patrick "es3tag" Hansen was a key part of FaZe's success during the BLAST Premier Spring Groups. The 27-year-old Dane came in as a stand-in for the Norwegian veteran Håvard "rain" Nygaard who took a break due to childbirth. 

With es3tag coming in and delivering such a great performance throughout all three matches that FaZe played at the event Twistzz doesn't understand how NIP could replace a player like es3tag. The Canadian aim god has high praises for the Dane after nine days as teammates. FaZe Clan went 3-0 with es3tag on the roster and became the first team to qualify for Spring Final after they took down OG 2-0 in their final match yesterday. 

The known and popular host James Banks also believes that stats aren't everything in Counter-Strike and es3tag is a great example of that.

Read more about es3tag and his incredible tournament in the article below:

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es3tag

FaZe took on OG in the Group B upper bracket final. Both teams managed to win their own map pick which therefore took the match into a map three. 

Inferno was left open as the decider and after just 15 rounds FaZe was in front 12-3 following a great T-side from the mixed European team. Despite losing the pistol and FaZe being sent on a forze buy the Canadian rifler secured his team the following round after he took down two OG players during an after plant. 

Watch Twistzz steal the round with two quick Deagle headshots in the video below:

FaZe Clan’s request to use Kristian “k0nfig” Wienecke as a stand-in for the BLAST Premier Spring Groups 2023 event has been denied by the tournament organizers, according to a report by Dexerto. This decision comes after their 28-year-old Norwegian rifler decided to skip the tournament in anticipation of the birth of his child.

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BLAST denied the request to use k0nfig due to the fact that he was registered on another team’s roster for the event. FaZe has been allowed to register a different player who is not listed on another team’s roster as a substitute.

"The request for an emergency substitution has been accepted as they only have four players currently available in Denmark. An update on the substitute will be made as soon as we have it." - BLAST told Pley.gg 

Twistzz also confirmed the news on Twitter, where he also mentioned that the change had been allowed by BLAST “for some time” but that “suddenly overnight everything changed.”

FaZe Clan are now pressured on time as they quickly have to find a replacement for the first match in Group B against Complexity on Friday at 12:00 (CET).

k0nfig

Recently HLTV’s official podcast, HLTV Confirmed, introduced a new dynamic to their episodes at the start of each season, a time capsule. The idea of this dynamic is for the three regular hosts (Professeur, SPUNJ and Striker) and the special guest (in this episode, Pimp) to predict the #1 team at the break, the Major winner and MVP, however they only have 30 seconds to explain themselves.

Striker predicted FaZe to be the #1 team at the break, stating that despite not winning anything in the second half of 2022 he believes their consistency will keep them at a high level. For the Major and MVP, he predicted G2 to win it all and m0NESY to take home the MVP, saying he believes G2 and m0NESY can peak higher than most teams, however they are not consistent.

For Pimp, Heroic will be the #1 team this season because, in his eyes, during the first half of the year the usual favorites will struggle while Heroic lineup will remain strong and stable. Regarding the Major and its MVP, Pimp was tempted to say Heroic but at the end he predicted G2 as the winners and m0NESY as the MVP because he thinks m0NESY will have a fantastic individual year and could even fight for a #1 spot.

Professeur took the same route as Striker for the first question and predicted FaZe as the #1 team at the break because they are “the safest option”. However, for the second question he drifted away and picked Vitality as the Major champions and ZywOo as the MVP, for him the fact that the Major is hosted in Paris will motivate apEX and this will elevate the team as a whole.

SPUNJ thinks that consistently high placings on important tournaments will give Na’Vi the #1 spot by the end of the incoming season. From his perspective, FaZe will win a second Major this season and Twistzz will get his MVP “because he is f- nuts”.

Finally, a deconstruction on the predictions.

Let's start with the prediction that both Striker and Professeur share, FaZe as the #1 team for this first season of 2023.

Both analysts justified their pick on the faith of FaZe’s consistency, however, how consistent FaZe actually are? If we take a look at the first half of 2022 we not only see that Faze are consistent, they are consistently the best team by quite a bit. Nevertheless, if we look at the events after last year’s summer break FaZe only had 2 top 4 appearances (one of them being in a lost final) and failed to win a single match on the Rio Major, not something you would expect out of a consistent team. 

This raises the question of which FaZe are we going to see during this first half of the year? 

Evidently both Striker and Professeur expect something more similar to the first half of 2022 from FaZe and honestly me as well. Karrigan is an excellent IGL and because FaZe didn’t need nor made any roster changes he can just focus on develop further their strat book and adapt their game plan to the obstacles they faced during the latest season and, on top of that, they have three young players in ropz, broky and Twistzz that are hungry for trophies.

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Now let's talk about Pimp’s pick, Heroic.

Heroic is a team that is considered consistent by many and shines when the favorites struggle which can be mainly attributed to the fact they don’t heavily depend on one of their players. Yes, it is true that stavn did perform better than his teammate throughout last year (which granted him the #10 spot on the HLTV top 20 players of 2022) but when he is having an off day it is not as impactful to the team as if ZywOo or S1mple (for example) had an off day which plays on Heroic advantage. 

However, we might be blinded by the superb second half of the year of Heroic and it is only fair to remind everyone that their first half of 2022 was far from perfect, they didn’t reach a final and only once managed to place top 4. Taking this into account the improvement on the second half of the year can be seen from two perspectives, the first, and most optimistic one, is that the break did them a favor and helped them sort out their issues which resulted in a much better performance or that during the second half of the year the teams that were dominating previously started to struggle thus giving room to other teams to fight for titles, without minimizing their improvement made during the break. 

In my opinion it is a bit of both, as Heroic did look much better after the summer break but they had such an amount of success because teams like FaZe and Na’Vi struggled to find their form. Going into the first season of 2023 I think that Heroic will be as solid as they did before the winter break if not more, however I have to disagree with Pimp because I don’t think that other teams (with the exception of, maybe, Na’Vi) will struggle, actually I believe that most top teams will return after the break in great form.

[image:{"source":"cloudinary","publicId":"teams/Heroic_exq52p","originalWidth":2048,"originalHeight":1152,"customWidth":"100%","customHeight":"100%","cloudinaryAssetData":true,"cloudName":"pley-gg","format":"jpg","caption":"Credit: BLAST and Stephanie Lindgren"}]

Now Na’Vi, SPUNJ’s pick to be the #1 team of the incoming season.

I honestly was surprised by this pick because from my point of view Na’Vi is in a similar situation to the one of FaZe having a fantastic first half of 2022 despite only winning one event and an inconsistent, to say the least, second half but Na’Vi has one more asterisk on them, the replacement of sdy with npl. We haven’t seen much of the ex-academy player, but from the small sample size we could conclude that he is not a direct upgrade to sdy and, from what we know, there is no plan for him to take the IGL role off electroNic’s back, which would justify the change. This move places a question mark on Na’Vi as a whole coming into the season and makes you wonder if B1ad3 can make this work. However, SPUNJ based his prediction on the belief that Na’Vi will achieve high placements on a consistent basis, which is something completely possible if S1mple, electroNic and b1t play as they did in 2021. In my opinion, Na’Vi will have a couple of deep runs but will struggle to find consistency as they will be trying to figure out the best way to utilize their newest addition.

[image:{"source":"cloudinary","publicId":"players/Npl_je9zkb","originalWidth":2048,"originalHeight":1152,"customWidth":"100%","customHeight":"100%","cloudinaryAssetData":true,"cloudName":"pley-gg","format":"jpg","caption":"Credit: Stephanie Lindgren"}]

Regarding the predictions of Major winners and MVPs. 

In my opinion, these are a bit more random and there is less to analyze because it is not a matter of which is the best team overall, but of which team peaks at the right time and, if multiple teams peak, which peak is higher. 

I believe all three teams they predicted have an equal chance to peak at the right time as they did not make any roster moves and can use both the break and previous events to prepare properly for the Major, in this regard only Vitality might have a slight edge over the others because of home crowd advantage for apEX and ZywOo.

[image:{"source":"cloudinary","publicId":"players/ZywOo_1_ebpuee","originalWidth":4096,"originalHeight":2731,"customWidth":"100%","customHeight":"100%","cloudinaryAssetData":true,"cloudName":"pley-gg","format":"jpg","caption":"Credit: Michael Konkol, BLAST"}]

Now the tough question, which peak is higher? 

Some could argue that we have already seen all three teams peak, FaZe during their last year’s streak of tournament wins, Vitality during EPL Season 16 and G2 during Blast World Final, however I think we have only seen FaZe’s peak. 

Last year, FaZe had during the first 6 months a dream scenario, Karrigan calling was superb, broky, ropz and Twistzz were not missing and even Rain had the spotlight on him from time to time (specially during the Major), this dream scenario has not happened with neither G2 nor Vitality. 

We have yet to see the trio of m0NESY, NiKo and huNter tear up their opposition and at the same time have HooXi calling as he did in the Blast World Final and jks returning to his top 20 form he once had.

We have yet to see the duo of ZywOo and Spinx live up to the hype it was given (ZywOo kept delivering but Spinx has struggled to regain his ENCE’s form) and at the same time have Magisk and dupreeh return to their prime while apEX calls as confidently as he does when he is feeling it.

As a fan of good counter-strike one can only dream to see the peak of each team face against each other, however it is highly unlikely to happen. We have to conform with predicting which team we think would be better, my personal bet is on G2’s peak. Where is yours?

m0NESY

ZywOo

Team Vitality

Heroic

After the first six months of 2022, it seemed like nothing could stop FaZe Clan in CS:GO. The international roster had won the biggest events during the first half of the year including the Antwerp Major. But then things changed after the summer break. All of a sudden FaZe started losing matches that they usually would win. The early exit from IEM Rio was the absolute downturn for karrigan's troops, who rebounded a bit with a Grand Final in BLAST Fall Finals in Copenhagen.

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One of the most consistent players on the roster was Russel “Twistzz” Van Dulken. The Canadian even continued this in the second part of 2022, where the rest of the roster (minus ropz) fell off a cliff in terms of ratings. On HLTV's annual Top 20 Player of the Year ranking, Twistzz is placed 11th for his efforts in 2022. A placement that the Canadian is not satisfied with.

- It’s not top 5 and unfortunately not even top 10, which for me isn’t good enough. I have to do better than this, but it is a step in the right direction and an improvement from last year, given my new role from the beginning of the year.

For Twistzz and FaZe a new year brings them new opportunities to chase the Grand Slam win, which will pay out $1,000,000 to the team. The team only needs one more win at one of these next four events; IEM Katowice 2023, Pro League Season 17, IEM Spring 2023, or IEM Dallas 2023.

- Personal goal [for 2023], the goal of being a top 5 player will never change. As for the team goal, I think we have a nice challenge ahead of us to be better than we were in 2022. The Grand Slam may appear close, but it will take a lot of work and we understand that. I think we want to win everything again and build a stronger era this time, Twistzz tells HLTV.

You can read the full interview and article with Russel “Twistzz” Van Dulken [link:{"url":"https://www.hltv.org/news/35343/top-20-players-of-2022-twistzz-11","isNewTab":true,"text":"here"}].

As the title explains this article will focus on the distinction between the star players of CS:GO and the lower-tiers of the game.

To set the scene we’ll start off with a quote by Russel “Twistzz” Van Dulken, arguably one of the best aimers in history, from November this year.

- At the end of the day, Counter-Strike is about aiming. It relies a lot on mechanics, and when young players are grinding the game, they obviously catch up pretty fast. I used to feel before that there was a skill gap between tier-2 and tier-1 players – but not really anymore. It’s more on who’s having the better leader or the most experience.

A perception, which CS:GO expert and caster Mohan "launders" Govindasamy, seemed to agree on when we spoke to him shortly after his Canadian countryman. You can find both interviews with Twistzz and launders at the bottom of the article.

With the knowledge and input of launders and Twistzz, we asked Niels Christian “NaToSaphiX” Sillassen to take a deeper look into the matter and for him to give his take through a demo analysis. Give it a watch down below.

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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:

degster

NiKo

huNter

EliGE

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.

In the match Russel "Twistzz" Van Dulken impressed several times during the match including a stellar showing on Anubis, where the Canadian wielded the AWP to almost perfection.

After the match, we talked with the former Team Liquid player, who enjoyed playing against his old teammates again.

The first semifinalist has been found after FaZe Clan took down the North American Team Liquid in the Upper bracket final. 

Both FaZe and Liquid went for their "safe" pick as Team liquid picked Mirage doing the veto and FaZe went with Inferno. 

Starting off on Team Liquid´s map pick Mirage. Liquid came out firing at FaZe as the North American team managed to take a 7-1 lead on the T side. FaZe bounced back and stopped the bleeding by giving themselves seven rounds on the CT side. The second half started with the mixed European team converting the pistol into three consecutive round wins, but Team Liquid was the stronger team in the end and managed to secure a 16-14 victory. 

Next up was FaZe´s map pick Inferno. A map that both teams have looked great on throughout 2022. FaZe came out strong despite losing the first pistol round. What looked like a decent CT side from Team Liquid, ended up being a stunning T side for karrigan and co. A 4-11 lead in favor of FaZe. On the CT side, FaZe kept on being dominant as they took five out of six rounds to close out the game 5-16. 

Anubis was left over as the deciding map. With high confidence and Twistzz on fire, FaZe clan took 12 rounds on the favored CT side. Switching over to the CT side made things a bit easier for the North American team. EliGE and the rest of his team played well doing the first five rounds on the CT side, but what looked like a comeback came fast to an end as Twistzz kept on playing lights out. FaZe Clan took the victory 9-16 and the series win 1-2. 

Team Liquid – FaZe 1-2| BLAST Premier World Finals

16-14 (Mirage)  YEKINDAR – 1.58 Rating / 31-19 K-D / 112.1 ADR

5-16 (Inferno) |  Twistzz – 1.73 Rating / 20-10 K-D / 104.3 ADR

9-16 (Anubis) | Twistzz - 1.73 Rating / 29-14 K-D / 116.2 ADR

Russel "Twistzz" Van Dulken secures himself yet another trophy after he won the esports play of the year. 

Doing the IEM Cologne 2022, FaZe took on Natus Vincere in a thriller match that went all the way to the fifth. The scoreline was 14-14 when the Canadian pulled out the most insane play of 2022. FaZe ended up winning the round and the tournament because of the clutch play from the Canadian aim god.  

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The pistol round is the first round of each half and is the only round where players on both teams are restricted to only pistols. Winning the first round usually leads to winning the first two or the rounds of the half. Sometimes you might win the pistol but end up losing to a force buy in the following round anyway, it's the game of Counter-Strike. The pistol round is really important because its free rounds on both T and CT side. Taking both pistols will give you six rounds where your side has the clear upper hand.

But who is the best pistol player on the CS:GO scene?

Top 10 pistol players against top 20 teams (K/D Diff | K/D | Rating)

	30 days	90 days
Fixture count	0	0
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Twistzz

Player stats

Articles mentioning Twistzz

Everything you need to know about IEM Cologne 2024

Liquid qualifies for IEM Dallas

Twistzz announced on Liquid: I wanted something that has longevity to it

FaZe smash ENCE in the quarter-final at IEM Sydney

Clutch Cancer! CS:GO stars joins the fight against Cancer

Pley of the Day: A $1.2M ace from Twistzz!

FaZe only one win away from the Intel Grand Slam

Twistzz: People are overreacting really bad with Source 2

Twistzz: I dont understand how a team can replace a player like Patrick (es3tag)

Pley of the Day: Twistzz silence OG with his Deagle

What now FaZe? k0nfig rejected as stand-in by BLAST

Who is winning the Paris Major? Who will be MVP? Who will be the #1 team at the break?

Twistzz: I have to do better than this

Is there still a skill gap between Tier-1 and Tier-2 players in CS:GO?

Highest rated players at BLAST World Finals

FaZe duo is the highest rated players at BLAST World Finals

Twistzz after stellar showing: It was fun to play against my friends from Liquid

FaZe Clan is the first team to secure semi-finals!

Twistzz wins Esports Play of the Year

Best pistol round players in 2022 so far

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