Two roads, the battle between the chosen, s1mple and EliGE

The two best “cinderella” stories of Major CS:GO history belonged to Liquid at MLG Columbus 2016 and ESL Cologne 2016. The stories and troubles surrounding Liquid’s roster before both tournaments only add to the impression. Impressed with what they did at those two tournaments. At MLG Columbus they made the top 4, at ESL Cologne they made it to the final. At both tournaments, their two stars were Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev and Jonathan “EliGE” Jablonowski. After that, they never competed together again, although their paths no longer intersect, but the destination is still the same. They are the chosen ones and one day the battle between them will decide the championship.

The beginnings of these two paths are not so different. S1mple was famous for his talent at the beginning of his CS:GO career, but he has a terrible attitude. He’s too emotional and overall a bad teammate. Things were so bad that he moved to a new team every 3 months. His longest stint on any team was at FlipSid3 Tactics for 8 months in 2015. During that time, FlipSid3 Tactics competed at WESG 2015 and had to play against a substitute. They invited Spencer “Hiko” Martin and this changed everything.

As for EliGE, he turned pro in Starcraft 2. Started with 1v1 matches and worked his way up to the NA WCS. However, like other Starcraft 2 players, he understands the power of a well-balanced team.

“I played SC2 for a while, but when I saw CS:GO starting to test and I got a demo, I started playing it whenever I had time, and I really enjoyed it. I started playing deathmatch more and when I failed to make it to WCS season 2, because they released an update on the night of the finals, this completely changed everything I was prepared for. I got really bored and ready to switch to CS:GO.” – HLTV Interview

EliGE was originally a StarCraft 2 player

He was still young, inexperienced, and still in school when he switched to CS:GO. However, he proved his ability when along with Nicholas “nitr0” Cannella was recruited into the official team of Liquid. And they’ve been with Liquid ever since, and Keith “NAF” Markovic returned to them almost three years later.

Liquid gradually got stronger and everything changed when Hiko joined at the end of 2015. Hiko is a player who is dedicated to winning and he is willing to do anything to get there. This seems to have prompted a change in the roster that has played for Liquid all the time, even after Hiko’s departure. The biggest move Hiko ever made was recruiting s1mple to Liquid.

At that point, s1mple was not a “chosen one”. He was a great talent, but squandered it with the Worst Players, a team of friends of s1mple. Looks like it’ll be a few more years before s1mple gets another chance to play for a top-tier CS:GO team because of personality issues. However, he did meet someone who could deal with this problem.

That person was Hiko and he was the one who invited s1mple to Liquid. Both of them respect each other since they played together at ESWC 2015. Hiko can deal with s1mple’s personality and s1mple is aware of this and respects Hiko.

However, even if Hiko could endure it, his comrades could not. The atmosphere was chaotic when s1mple moved under the Liquid roof in North America. He is young, sensitive and unprepared for life’s changes. At the same time, the other players on Liquid couldn’t stand s1mple’s personality and these players kept coming in and out of the lineup. They are Eric “adreN” Hoag, Kenneth “koosta” Suen, Jacob “Pimp” Winneche, and Joshua “jdm64” Marzano. Even the coach switched from James “GBJames” O’Connor to Luis “peacemaker” Tadeu.

Those days on the Liquid roster were extremely tense and each story told aggravated the atmosphere, to the point where players and coaches had to scream at each other, a suffocating atmosphere. When people run out of energy, players lose where they want to play, and players lose respect for their teammates and the end result is sending them off.

However, through all those difficulties, the Liquid squad has done the impossible. They made it to the top 4 at the MLG Columbus Major and the 2016 ESL Cologne Finals. A final that no North American team had ever reached in CS:GO history until Cloud 9’s historic victory. at ELeague Boston 2018. Both are based on excellent skill, mainly that of s1mple and EliGE. Shows that s1mple is an outstanding world-class player and EliGE is a star. And that never happened again.

S1mple has decided to leave the team. He couldn’t stand living in North America anymore and the ESL Cologne 2016 Major was his last tournament with Liquid. At the tournament, Liquid defeated Na`Vi in the quarterfinals and that’s when the CIS team realized they needed s1mple. So they decided to recruit him and not long after s1mple joined Na`Vi.

S1mple decided to choose the CIS team

The other side of the story we hear is that EliGE told the organization either s1mple is gone or he is. And the organization decided to choose EliGE. S1mple is a superstar, but EliGE is also a young talent. He’s proven he can face the best players in the world and they can build a NA roster around him while s1mple’s time with the roster is running out, even if he doesn’t. they can convince s1mple to stay instead of leaving for Na`Vi (GBjames insists that they can convince s1mple to stay if Hiko asks)

The two stars soon ran into each other after going their separate ways at ESL New York 2016. They met in the quarterfinals and it was a great game, but in the end Na`Vi won and won the tournament. . Even so, the Liquid roster showed incredible potential along with the strength of Na`Vi. At that time we thought they would compete for the world No. 1 position.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYfmnl3wyVQ

That did not happen as we expected. The potential of the players is huge, but both have serious and unresolved personality issues. S1mple still has a hot head, Ladislav “GuardiaN” Kovacs calls him “a wild beast”. As for EliGE, he has the opposite problem. His spirit is completely broken and he is always negative when confronting his problems. He hid his problems, but because of that, when they officially started playing, there was no turning back. He admits that is a weakness of his, “I think the internal conflicts from the past are still present, especially with me, and they have stood in our way.”

As both players tried to improve in the team, they went down the same path. S1mple got stronger and stronger until he became the best player in the world, but he still couldn’t win tournaments. One of the big factors is the policy of limiting coaches and almost kicking Sergey “starix” Ischuk from the server. The team tried to fill the void with Denis “seized” Kostin, but it not only failed, but destroyed the way s1mple played. The personalities were too different and in the end GuardiaN left the squad.

At that time, EliGE also faced the same problem. The lineup with Pimp and JDM64 failed. Similar problems are evident. The team continued to change their roster, bringing in Russel “Twistzz” Van Dulken and Peter “stanislaw” Jarguz. The roster worked for a while, but stanislaw’s ideas clashed with Wilton “zews” Prado and he was, in turn, kicked out of the team. During this time EliGE became the best NA player, proving that at least personally, he was the pick.

However, both players have similar problems. Their personalities influence the results they desire as an individual or as a team. Both s1mple and EliGE have to deal with that. And they did. Part of it comes from a good captain. Danylo “Zeus” Teslenko for s1mple and nitr0 for EliGE. And it’s partly their fault. Since the roster was first formed, we haven’t heard anything bad from Na`Vi or Liquid about their two stars. Part of it is also because they are confident in their squad. Na`Vi recruited Denis “electronic” Sharipov and Liquid recruited NAF.
Both players were in discussions about changing rosters last year. S1mple almost joined SK, EliGE was about to join Cloud 9. No deal was successful and s1mple continued to be the superstar of Na`Vi. EliGE is still the star player for Liquid as he has been and gives even more than before as an individual and as a member of the team.

It’s been almost two years since they’ve been together, and both stars have struck a chord in the world of CS:GO. Na`Vi is once again the best CIS team. Liquid finally became the best NA team. Now that the old teammates have become rivals in matches, they last met at ESL New York almost two years ago.

At ESL Proleague season 7 in Dallas, the two teams played on Dust 2 for the first time. A map where s1mple, nitr0 and EliGE played together to defeat Fnatic at MLG Columbus. It was an extremely close match, but Liquid was the team to go ahead and win. The second map is a massacre, mostly by EliGE on the CT-side. In this encounter, Liquid won and EliGE delivered on its promise. Liquid picked him and he proved it for them.

It was only the first time they faced each other and in the future there will be many more battles between these two stars. Both are stars of teams with internal problems and conflicts. Both are now aiming for semi-finals and finals at international LAN tournaments. Thinking back to the potential they had when they were on the same team, now they were able to achieve them apart from each other. Both teams are now among the best in the world and have built their rosters around picks. Na`Vi is s1mple, Liquid is EliGE. Although their time together was not long, it has shaped their careers quite similarly. Both have talent, both have personality issues that prevent them from growing on the team. Both have overcome those barriers. Both are the chosen ones of the team and this is their battle. Na`Vi vs Liquid, s1mple vs EliGE.

According to VPesports