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GUIDES
Simple Radar
© 2026 TLDR Media, All Rights Reserved.
ZyWho?
Typically, we’d consider this a spoiler, but you should understand by now that Vitality were the champions of BLAST Open Rotterdam when it began.
There was a record broken during this event, though, because a Vitality player not named ZywOo won an MVP award for the very first time.
Rotterdam is a global trading hub, the only Dutch city with a skyline, and one with a long history of a hard-working labour class. A true city of the people.
Rotterdammers have an expression that goes “niet lullen, maar poetsen”, which roughly translates to “no d-cking about, get to work”.
What other city could better exemplify Vitality’s hard work to the top other than this one?
The road to the arena is a comfortable one. If you take the metro from the architecturally imposing Central Station, Line D or E will take you to Zuidplein - but not before rising above the ground and crossing the Maas river. Here is where you’re treated to a beautiful view of the city’s modern architecture, along with the port, SS Rotterdam ship, and the famous watertaxis.
After that, it’s a short walk to what we all came for: the arena. Ahoy is a respectable size for these kinds of events, hosting around 14,000 excited fans ahead of the Grand Final.
Boy, were those fans amazing.
On any given day, you lot cheered in a scarily close to fifty-fifty division for both teams, and the city’s Turkish diaspora came out in previous days as well to give us one hell of a show in support of Aurora.
As anxious fans filled the arena, anticipation filled the room. With the countdown on the big screen getting ever closer to zero, stage host Darfmike - alongside pasha - did a quick check with the crowd: Vitality or NAVI?
If the cheers were to be believed, the game would’ve ended in a tie. If only such a thing were possible.
The grand final of BLAST Open Rotterdam proved two things. First - NAVI might actually be a contender for next-best in the world. Second - everyone is still light years away from Vitality.
The world number one opted to start the BO5 out on Inferno. While NAVI kept it close by the end of the first half, it wouldn’t last, as the newly dubbed “Estonian donk” dropped a 2.07 rating to close the map out 13-7.
NAVI’s first pick, Anubis, began in similar fashion, with a closer first half and a runaway Vitality in the second half. Aleksib and co. made an attempt at a comeback, stringing together five T-side rounds late on, but apEX eventually found traction and closed the map 13-10.
Dust 2 would finish the series as Vitality this time ran away with a 9-3 T-side, once again spearheaded by ropz. The series point was found at 12-4, though they wouldn’t win the game until 13-10 once again, as NAVI were kind enough to give us a little tease before killing our hopes and dreams.
Isn’t Counter-Strike a wonderful game? You throw some grenades, shoot some people, and then Vitality win.
That being said, NAVI did put up a good fight. Despite never having a lead bigger than a single round during the final, they seemed to find a good rhythm to take the final two maps back to a closer scoreline.
That’s more than you can say for a lot of other teams.
The win is Vitality’s third consecutive trophy, and the flawless victory extends their streak of victorious big events maps to twenty-two, the second longest in history. That’s a win streak that would make even Don Shula blush.
ZywOo also set a new record, this time by not getting the MVP award.
Despite being the third-highest rated player on his team across the event, ropz’s nuclear playoffs performance well and truly earned him the MVP award. He is the first Vitality player not named ZywOo to take one home, and we feel it was a long time coming.
Now we’re just waiting for flameZ and mezii to get theirs. Maybe at some point in the next twenty-two maps…
After the medals were handed out and things died down a little bit, we spoke to ZywOo regarding the team’s performance, the map veto, how they keep the discipline, and what to expect from them in 2026.
First of all, congratulations on your win. I want to start with the veto, were you expecting Anubis from NAVI, or was is a surprise?
I mean, we expected all the maps, it’s a BO5. We of course did not expect it as the first pick, but we knew maybe it could be the second pick because it’s been a while. We didn’t play this map during this tournament, maybe they saw something during the antistrat. Obviously we always expect a surprise, nothing crazy but when you’re underdogs you want to surprise us.
If I had to describe Vitality’s playstyle right in one word, I would say “discipline”. What are you guys doing to stay disciplined, to prevent yourself from overpeeking, overcommitting?
We have apEX, who is the daddy in the team, so whenever we do a bit too much he’s the one to slap us in the face in a way, but I think everyone just wants to pay so good that we don’t have to talk about it. We know we have five good players so we don’t need to say something about that, and we know that when we make a mistake we instantly know what to do and how to fix it. So this team is incredible for that, we don’t have to think, the discipline has always been there.
You’re on a 16 match win streak now, which means you have two entries in the top five longest win streaks ever, how does that feel?
To be honest, we’re not really thinking about it. When we entered this tournament, we didn’t know we were in a win streak. Because we are so focused on what we can do, what we can bring to the next game, we are not really focused about whether we have a win streak or not. Of course it’s a good feeling to be able to maybe break a new record but that’s not our main focus, for us it’s the Major and the Grand Slam.
Do you think not focusing on that is what allows you to have this long win streak?
Maybe it’s less pressure. I mean, we talk about it a little bit, but when I say a little bit it’s maybe once a month, you know? So of course it’s in our minds, but we don’t feel pressure about it. Having a win streak is just a bonus, we don’t care about breaking the record, that’s not our goal.
Specifically about Anubis, we saw ropz bring out the AUG a few times, do you know why?
Because we knew if I got to peek mid or B, b1t he likes to come and should peek everything. So he was kind of a counter for him or for anyone, or for anyone else who was coming A.
Finally, of course this is another win for you. How much confidence does this give you for the rest of 2026?
A lot. Since Krakow we have a lot of confidence. As a team we know we are able to do everything, and the entire team is confident because of it. When you see ropz and flameZ playing like this during the tournament, ropz this final and flameZ the entire tournament… I think it builds confidence for everyone and we’re able to play our style.
Interview by napz
