s1mple’s Career

The start of s1mple

The first time we saw s1mple playing at a semi-pro level was for Lan Dodgers. The time s1mple played for Lan Dodgers is not really known. S1mple then goes and joins Courage which consisted of:

Olexandr “s1mple” Kostylev
Konstantin “Pr1zraK” Krivosheev
Andrey “B1ad3” Gorodenskiy
Roman “z1” Poltavchenko
Georgi “WorldEdit” Yaskin.

It turned out to be a short time stay at the organization Courage, playing 14 maps, they then played by the name Hashtag. Hashtag goes on and wins $4,150 at the Voronezh Cup 2014, beating 97club from Belarus. 

Reunited with Lan Dodgers again.

S1mple leaves Hashtag for Lan Dodgers again. His stay with them is not known, but after the stay at Lan Dodgers, he goes on to join Amazing Gaming.

S1mple’s breakthrough.

September 18, 2014, s1mple joins Hellraisers just days after Adren left. Hellraisers at the time was a top 15 team. 

The lineup of Hellraisers consisted of: 

Yegor “markeloff” Markelov
Kirill “ANGE1” Karasiow
Mihail “Dosia” Stolyarow
Emil “kUcheR” Akhundov 
Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev

For the timespan s1mple was on Hellraisers, they earned $23,675. S1mple’s biggest achievement was beating Fnatic to go to the quarterfinals of DreamHack Winter 2014. On January 14, 2015, Hellraisers replaced s1mple and markeloff with the duo from Dat Team flamie and Adren.

S1mple returns to B1ad3 in Dat Team.

On January 15, it was announced that s1mple and markeloff joined Dat Team. The lineup consisted of:

Andery “B1ad3” Gorodenskiy
Vladyslav “bondik” Nechyporchuk 
Georgi “Worldedit” Yaskin
Yegor “markeloff” Markelov
Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev

The only thing s1mple achieved on Dat team was winning the MCS Open Season 1 Finals for $5,000 vs Aces.

Dat Team becomes Flipsid3 Tactics.

Flipsid3 Tactics still consisted of the same players as Dat Team. S1mple’s stay on Flipsid3 was not as long as expected, so on July 17, 2015, s1mple leaves the team, following internal problems culminating at ESWC 2015, but remains under contract with the organization.

S1mple with no team.

In the timespan of July 20, 2015 to January 2, 2016, s1mple had no real team to play with, except friends. 

S1mple joins Team Liquid.

On January 2, 2016, it was announced that Team Liquid signed s1mple. This by far was the best team s1mple had ever been on. The lineup consisted of:

Eric “adren” Hoag
Spencer “Hiko” Martin 
Nick “nitr0” Canella 
Jonathan “EliGE” Jablonowski 
Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev 

S1mple would go on to get in the semi-finals in the first $1,000,000 major tournament in CS:GO, being two rounds away from the final, losing to Luminosity Gaming. On Liquid, s1mple won a whopping $76,000, but on April 21, s1mple announced that he left Liquid to seek an European team.

S1mple today and what’s next for him.

Today, s1mple is still under contract for Liquid, but he is playing on Worst Players. Worst Players consists of:

Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev
Vladislav “arch” Svistov 
Ilya “fix” Golovko
Igor “crush” Shevchenko                                                                                                                                                                                                               Ivan “F1L1N” Semenets

Worst Players is way below S1mple’s level of Counter-Strike. For now, I see him playing with Worst Players until his contract expires or gets signed by Natus Vincere and they pay Liquid money for him. The only thing Worst Players has done with s1mple is finishing top-six in StarLadder i-League Invitational #1 winning $5,000 and losing against Godsent 2-1.