Chopper: "M0NESY is very f**king strong. But s1mple was even more f**king stronger"
2024-08-06 12:16:00Team Spirit IGL Leonid "chopper" Vishnyakov compared G2 Esports star Ilya "m0NESY" Osipov to prime Oleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev. He thinks the young AWPer has to prove himself before they can be rated as the same. The Russian captain shared this on stream.
It was impossible to win against s1mple in 2019-2021. I struggled to do that. We defeated NAVI once, I don't even recall how exactly that happened. Maybe on just one map? Sasha was a beast individually during these three years, no joke. Yeah, everyone talks about his personality and all that. But that's just a fact: s1mple was the best.
I think if m0NESY continues playing like he does for two more years, after 3-4 years more, we'll be able to say if he's the best or not. So far, it's the beginning of the road for Ilya. He is so f**king strong. But s1mple was even more f**king stronger.
During the mentioned period, Spirit defeated NAVI only once, at the scandalous Epic CIS Spring 2021, which was one of the RMRs for Stockholm Major. Chopper and his teammates 2:0'ed the opponents and eliminated them from the event. That didn't stop NAVI from qualifying for the tournament and taking the trophy in Sweden after a flawless run.
M0NESY is playing his third year on the top-tier pro scene. He earned two MVP awards and won IEM Cologne and Katowice in 2023. He possibly reached his prime this year and entered the race for a Player of the Year award against donk and ZywOo.
