Oleksandr ‘s1mple’ Kostyliev is a professional Ukrainian CS:GO player for Natus Vincere. Fairly considered to be one of the greatest in the world, he claimed twenty-one MVP awards over the course of his career (as of January, 2023), breaking dev1ce’s previous record for most of them received.

s1mple received his latest MVP medal at IEM Cologne 2022, even though NAVI came in second. Let’s figure out how that happened and how he reacted. But first, we will learn what MVP means.

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What is MVP?

MVP stands for Most Valuable Player. These are the players, who display outstanding performance, have the greatest impact, and finish a CS:GO event with the best statistics.

Usually, the MVP of each tournament is a member of a winning team, but there are several exceptions. For instance, s1mple won a couple of MVP awards despite his team finishing second. This occurred four times at the following events:

• IEM Cologne 2022
• ESL Pro League Season 12
• DreamHack Masters Marseille 2018
• StarLadder & i-League StarSeries Season 4.

Bonus fact: at StarLadder & i-League StarSeries Season 4, s1mple became the first player ever to receive an MVP medal despite losing the event.

Further, we will go over Natus Vincere’s IEM Cologne 2022 run to see how s1mple performed individually and how he won his most recent MVP award while coming in second.

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IEM Cologne 2022

Cologne hosted the Intel Extreme Masters Season XVII in 2022. Natus Vincere rushed through the Upper Bracket of Group A beating MOUZ, Ninjas in Pyjamas, and Movistar Riders. In the Playoff stage, they defeated Astralis but suffered a heartbreaking loss to FaZe in the Grand Final. NAVI came in second place and got a prize of $180,000. 

HLTV rewarded s1mple with an MVP medal for his exceptional impact. He finished the event with a 1.25 rating and also had the best K-D (+95) and KPR (0.84) stats. Here’s a recap of the tournament and s1mple’s performance stats.

NAVI vs MOUZ

In their first match of the Group Stage, MOUZ won Mirage (14-16), and NAVI led the score on Nuke (16-12) and Inferno (16-6), winning the series.

See s1mple’s performance stats on Nuke:

See s1mple’s performance stats on Mirage:

See s1mple’s performance stats on Inferno:

s1mple outplayed four MOUZ players in a 1v4 post-plant situation. Check out the Twitch link here.

s1mple won a 1v1 post-plant duel against JDC, securing a win of both map and match. Check out the Twitch link here.

NAVI vs Ninjas in Pyjamas

For NAVI, the easiest match of the IEM Cologne 2022 turned out to be the one against Ninjas in Pyjamas. In the second match of the Group Stage, they won Overpass (16-3) and Nuke (16-7).

See s1mple’s performance stats on Overpass:

See s1mple’s performance stats on Nuke:

When NAVI players perfecto and s1mple found themselves in a 2v5 situation on Overpass, Sasha took the initiative and aced, clutching the round. Check out the Twitch link here.

NAVI vs Movistar Riders 

It was the third and the last match of the Group Stage for NAVI. The team lost the first map that was picked by the Movistar Riders, Inferno (9-16). After that, NAVI made a comeback on Mirage (16-11) and Overpass (16-10), securing the victory. 

See s1mple’s performance stats on Inferno:

See s1mple’s performance stats on Mirage:

See s1mple’s performance stats on Overpass:

s1mple won a semi-buy round by successfully holding A site on Overpass with Famas, making four frags. Check out the Twitch link here.

s1mple secured the match victory by winning the 1v1 post-plant duel with a knife kill. Check out the Twitch link here.

NAVI vs Astralis

NAVI went straight into the Playoff Semifinals, where they kicked Astralis off the bracket 2-0 and secured a spot in the Grand Final. The Ukrainian team won Nuke (16-8) and Mirage (19-17). Even though b1t has stolen the show on Mirage, s1mple still showed a great performance on Nuke.

See s1mple’s performance stats on Nuke:

See s1mple’s performance stats on Mirage:

On Nuke, s1mple opened the score with a Dual Elite triple kill while defending B bombsite. Check out the Twitch link here.

NAVI vs FaZe

In the Grand Final, Natus Vincere faced FaZe, a team who had not yet dropped a map in the competition. FaZe won the first map of the BO5, Inferno (16-13), followed by NAVI scoring Overpass (16-3) and Ancient (19-16).

Despite having an advantage in the score, NAVI was unable to win the series due to the fact that FaZe subsequently won Mirage (16-9) and Nuke (16-14).

See s1mple’s performance stats on Inferno:

See s1mple’s performance stats on Overpass:

See s1mple’s performance stats on Ancient:

See s1mple’s performance stats on Mirage:

See s1mple’s performance stats on Nuke:

On Nuke, s1mple performed a 1v2 clutch on the T side. Once he got karrigan coming out of the vent on A, Sasha planted the bomb on B and killed broke shortly after. Check out the Twitch link here.

How s1mple Reacted to Getting the MVP Award 

s1mple noted before that for him it is much more important to win the tournament with his team rather than being the MVP. 

After receiving his well-deserved IEM Cologne 2022 MVP award, s1mple threw his medal in the crowd. 

To Sum Up!

NAVI lost the Grand Final despite s1mple’s excellent performances. Nevertheless, he was the only deserving candidate for the IEM Cologne 2022 MVP award. Sasha’s statistics versus FaZe in the final match had decreased, but performed in all the other matches excellently.

In addition to receiving his twenty-first MVP medal, the most recent one to date (as of January, 2023), s1mple also became the first player to be honored with three HLTV MVP awards at the Cologne events. Explore our blog for more esports news, guides, and articles about CS:GO skins.