FaZe Clan`s new sniper, Oleksandr `s1mple` Kostyliev, has stated his belief that Mathieu `ZywOo` Herbaut is currently the best player in the professional CS2 scene. This opinion was shared during a stream with Roman Mokrivskiy.
During the conversation, s1mple noted that as a FaZe Clan player, he could face various significant rivals, including Natus Vincere. However, he expressed a particularly strong desire to defeat Team Vitality.
He was quoted as saying: “I would be happy to [destroy] Team Vitality in the quarterfinals, even if [we lose] afterwards. Just to specifically [destroy] Vitality — to show them it`s not that easy. … And if we also beat NAVI? That would be something else, you know? Imagine the potential storylines. Absolute Cinema could happen.”
On May 5, FaZe Clan announced that s1mple would temporarily replace Helvijs `broky` Saukants. Kostyliev remains under contract with Natus Vincere; he joined the American organization on a loan basis and is scheduled to represent them only at IEM Dallas 2025 and BLAST.tv Austin Major 2025.