In one of the opening best-of-threes at IEM Sydney on Oct. 17, Nikola “NiKo” Kovač hit one of the most ridiculous trick shots you’ll ever see in CS2 to break the match against Complexity wide-open. Michael “Grim” Wince made a play through a smoke grenade to try and stop the take before it happened, and taking the kill on NiKo would’ve stopped the push before it began as teammate Jonathan “EliGE Jablonowski bags a kill in the background.
Unfortunately for Complexity, Grim’s FAMAS betrayed him, and NiKo capitalized on the opening to score arguably the best no-scope of IEM Sydney thus far. NiKo started Ancient slow, with just a single kill to his name before the fateful round, but finished 17-11 in K/D as G2 took the series 2-0 and the map 13-7.
The play is made even more absurd when NiKo’s position is taken into account. He rarely plays with the AWP, the big green sniper is reserved for Russian prodigy Ilya “m0NESY” Osipov on G2. NiKo is arguably the best rifler in the world, and was one of the top five players in the history of CS:GO while rarely touching the AWP, a truly rare feat considering the gun’s impact on matches.
The victory sends G2 into the upper bracket final in Group B to play ENCE, and it knocks Complexity down to the lower bracket to face a retooled Cloud9 roster. A grand finals victory for G2 isn’t out of the question, the roster has won several events in their current formation, like IEM Cologne and IEM Katowice. However, the big one, a Major title, still eludes NiKo. He’s considered the best player to have never won a Major in CS:GO, despite finishing second in a Major only twice: at the PGL Stockholm Major in 2021, and at the ELEAGUE Boston Major in 2018.
