Zyw0o beats s1mple to become the top-ranked player of 2019

Team Vitality member Mathieu “ZywOo” Herbaut is the number one player in HLTV’s rankings for 2019.

ZywOo beat out Natus Vincere’s Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev for the number one spot. The 19-year-old French player impressed throughout 2019, growing into a dangerous presence on any server. Since he joined Team Vitality in October of 2018, ZywOo helped Vitality win DreamHack Open Atlanta 2018, Charleroi Esports 2019, cs_summit 4, and ECS Season 7. ZywOo and Vitality capped off 2019 with a win against a surging mousesports team at EPICENTER Moscow 2019.

He collected a total of five MVP medals last year, including several at tournaments where Vitality failed to make the grand finals. With an average rating of 1.37 and a 28-map streak with a rating above 1.00, ZywOo is more than deserving of the accolade.

ZywOo top CSGO player over s1mple, Liquid have three in top ten

2019 saw s1mple fall from the top spot to number two in the world. The Na`Vi star hasn’t been nearly as dominant in the past year as he has before, likely due to the loss of in-game leader Danylo “Zeus” Teslenko and the return of Ladislav “GuardiaN” Kovács. While s1mple missed out the top spot this year, number two is a reasonable finish for a player with his talent.

The rest of the top ten includes two Astralis players in Nicolai “dev1ce” Reedtz at number three and Emil “Magisk” Reif at number five. Team Liquid’s Jonathon “EliGE” Jablonowski placed at number four, bolstered by a year of consistency with no sign of slowing down.

With TL’s Keith “NAF” Markovic at number seven and Russel “twistzz” Van Dulken at number nine, Team Liquid was the only CSGO team with more than two players inside the top ten. mousesports Robin “ropz” Kool finished off the top ten.

1. Mathieu “ZywOo” Herbaut
2. Aleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev
3. Nicolai “device” Reedtz
4. Jonathan “EliGE” Jablonowski
5. Emil “Magisk” Reif
6. Denis “electronic” Sharipov
7. Keith “NAF” Markovic
8. Vincent “Brehze” Cayonte
9. Russel “Twistzz” Van Dulken
10. Robin “ropz” Kool
11. Nikola “NiKo” Kovac
12. Özgür “woxic” Eker
13. Jere “sergej” Salo
14. Andreas “Xyp9x” Højsleth
15. Justin “jks” Savage
16. Peter “dupreeh” Rasmussen
17. Freddy “KRIMZ” Johansson
18. Tsvetelin “CeRq” Dimitrov
19. Ludvig “Brollan” Brolin
20. Ethan “Ethan” Arnold

Astralis has four members inside the top 20 CSGO players

As expected, four out of five players from Astralis made HLTV’s list, including Xyp9x and dupreeh at numbers 14 and 16, respectively. Astralis returned to form near in the second half of 2019, winning the StarLadder Berlin Major and several other tournaments. The Danes reclaimed the title of the number one team from Team Liquid in November 2019 after Liquid had usurped the throne for some months.

Astralis will look to continue their run of form in 2020 with the upcoming BLAST Premier Spring tournament series starting in London on January 31.

Team Vitality and ZywOo be there as well, so fans will be able to see the number one player in the world in action against other top teams in CSGO including Na`Vi, Evil Geniuses, MIBR, and FaZe Clan.