17-year-old Counter-Strike prodigy carries his team to tournament victory in a performance dubbed one of the greatest in the history of the game

13.02.2024 - 17:43 / gamesradar.com / Ali Jones

A Counter-Strike 2 pro is being hailed for delivering one of the greatest esports performances of all time, despite having only played in one major tournament and being just 17 years old.

Danil 'donk' Kryshkovets joined Russian Counter-Strike 2 outfit Team Spirit in the summer of 2023. Since then, the team has been on an impressive run of form, culminating in its victory at IEM Katowice over the weekend. Spirit swept Faze 3-0 in the best-of-five Finals, in a match absolutely carried by donk.

Claiming 82 kills over just 62 rounds, and with only 40 deaths, donk also secured an average damage per round (ADR) of 124 - more than 40 higher than anyone else in the game. It's a performance so impressive that even when you see it for yourself, it's hard to believe these are purely human reactions. In the highlight reel below, the first two clips alone seem almost supernatural, and the expressions of donk's opponents make it clear that they have no idea what to make of it.

This was no single incident, either. Donk topped tournament-wide stats for ADR, total kills, kills per round, tying a seven-year record for overall rating. In almost all of those stats, while positions #2-5 were all pretty close, donk was a clear frontrunner, leaving teammate and opposition alike far behind.

His performance is already seeing him hailed as one of the greats. In one clip, tournament caster Machine labels him "unprecedented, eclipsing all who came before him." Team Liquid content creator Alex Debets suggested that donk's tournament performance could be "statistically the best off [sic] all time," while former pro Jacob Winneche described his finals effort as "the single greatest tournament performance I can ever remember." Some of those sentiments even extend to esports as a whole, with the suggestion that donk's finals performance was up there with some of the best solo efforts in the entire industry.

donk two maps into the IEM Katowice grand final vs FaZe. This is the single greatest tournament performance I can ever remember. It can’t be understated what donk and spirit is about to accomplish. pic.twitter.com/Lx08pMP489February 11, 2024

It's worth pointing out that this was only donk's first top-tier tournament, and at just 17, that makes it a bit tricky to name him Counter-Strike's new Greatest of all Time. At the very least, Navi's s1mple, who spent five consecutive years considered either #1 or #2 player in the world, or Vitality's Zywoo, who was 2023's best player and held s1mple from the top spot in 2019 and 2020, are better contenders for that title. Nevertheless, it seems that Team Spirit has found a player to keep an eye on.

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