Team Vitality plans a decade of CS2 dominance with ZywOo Team VitalityAhead of ZywOo\u2019s confirmed renewal with Team Vitality through 2026, Dexerto sat with him, as well as both the org\u2019s co-founders, to discuss the now-legendary Counter-Strike player\u2019s history and their reasons for re-signing the \u2018King of Counter-Strike\u2019. He may be staying with the org even past 2026. Though there are a number of old-school Counter-Strike players who have been dominating for over a decade and have cemented their names in the annals of CS history, the later half of CS:GO\u2019s life cycle was dominated by Mathieu \u2018ZywOo\u2018 Herbaut. So, it should come as no surprise that Team Vitality have decided to renew his contract through 2026, perhaps with plans to keep him for even longer than that. Dexerto caught up with both of Vitality\u2019s co-founders, CEO Nicolas \u201cNico\u201d Maurer and Chairman Fabien \u201cNeo\u201d Devide, as well as ZywOo himself, to get the story from both sides on why he\u2019s such an important part of Team Vitality. Only as good as your last match Through our time with ZywOo, his focus was made crystal clear. He doesn\u2019t really have any long-term goals or plans, no grand aspirations, and no desire to be put on a pedestal above other players based on achievements alone. Even if he\u2019s being crowned the King of Counter-Strike. That isn\u2019t to say that he lacks motivation, but more that ZywOo focuses solely on the match in front of him. Regardless of what he\u2019s accomplished so far in Counter-Strike, a loss on the day makes him the worse player. \u201cI\u2019ve never actually thought about that, what it feels like to play with me or play against me, anything like that. I\u2019m just living day by day, not thinking about the future or the past and doing my best. Trying to be the best player, be the best version of me, of myself. That\u2019s been working for six years, and I won\u2019t change.\u201d However, there are some things that have changed over the years. ZywOo was, at one point, a rookie on a hot streak. As time went on, though, people began to realize that he just played that well all the time. Every big tournament win and MVP award came with even more expectations being heaped upon him and the team, to a point where the pressure really started getting to him. \u201c[There\u2019s] a bit more pressure. Because, you know, we don\u2019t want to do the same mistakes from 2022.\u201d ZywOo explained. \u201cSomething changed about the mentality, about the pressure, because we start to think about, \u2018What if you lose against this small team?\u2019 Yeah, we had a bit of pressure. We are the biggest team, and we need to prove it.\u201d That said, the same mentality ZywOo vowed to stick with is what brought Vitality back from their slump. Though they placed among the top teams at Katowice 2023, this finish wasn\u2019t good enough for him. \u201cAfter we have a good talk about what we need to bring, what we need to put up for our game, for anything, I didn\u2019t feel any pressure. We just play our game, we just think about what Vitality needs to bring to the table to win the game.\u201d ZywOo claimed. \u201cWe didn\u2019t want to give anyone the throne.\u201d After talking to team owner Neo, this mentality was just as much a reason for keeping ZywOo with the team as his insanely strong performance in-game. Finding and refining Team Vitality\u2019s approach ZywOo has gone from a rookie to a seasoned veteran during his time on Team Vitality. Both him and apEX have been with the club from the very start, and Vitality co-founder and chairman Neo feels that they\u2019ve chosen the right players to build around. \u201cIt didn\u2019t come that quick, to be honest. It took years and years of construction and frustration, especially for [winning] majors.\u201d Neo claimed when reflecting on his years with the club. His approach in taking things game by game closely mirrors ZywOo\u2019s. Winning is only the beginning. \u201cOf course, you will live this moment and pure happiness, and it\u2019s magic. But then, you\u2019re just focused on the next objective. That\u2019s the beauty of Counter-Strike. When you\u2019re lifting a trophy, two weeks after, you have to fight again to show that you deserve it. For us, it\u2019s sometimes like a cycle that never ends. That\u2019s why we needed to address the competitive calendar in an appropriate way.\u201d Neo\u2019s approach is a unique one. He takes a close look at the calendar for the competitive year and determines which tournaments are most important to win, encouraging his team to try new things and build confidence in new strategies to prepare for the battles that matter most. \u201cThere is no tournament where we go in saying, \u2018Hey, we will lose on purpose,\u2019 but some tournaments will be used to practice certain things or win confidence in certain aspects.\u201d he explained. The concept of \u201cpeaking\u201d in esports is hard to nail down. Some of the best underdog runs across every esport have been carried on the backs of a team that really found their stride at the right time. No team is going to be playing at their best all the time, but Neo\u2019s approach gives them the best chance of peaking at majors with strategies other teams don\u2019t know how to respond to. \u201cIt\u2019s good sometimes to release a bit of pressure and make sure we can peak at the right tournaments. I think performance and winning is all about communication and having a process where everyone is on board.\u201d Team Vitality\u2019s future rests with ZywOo Team Vitality co-founder and CEO Nico spoke with us a bit about ZywOo as well, particularly about how he feels that his story of starting with the club and going from a rookie to a star is representative of what he feels Team Vitality is all about. Considering Team Vitality\u2019s newfound success in Rocket League is built off of them scouting and developing rookie talent in a similar way to what they did with their first CS roster in 2018, it\u2019s no surprise that Vitality\u2019s CEO is invested in building their organization around their star players. People are just as loyal to players as they are to orgs, if not even more so in favor of players, so holding on to top-tier talent is just as good for winning as it is for building a fandom. And, while Team Vitality has struggled with League of Legends, they\u2019ve managed to make their mark on a number of other esports through their tenure as an organization. \u201cThere\u2019s no secret recipe or secret sauce formula to winning. Everyone, at some point, thinks they have found one. But no, it\u2019s not that easy, especially performing well in multiple titles. But we\u2019ve still learned a few things.\u201d Vitality\u2019s CEO mused. \u201cIt\u2019s not only about the addition of talent, you need to create that chemistry. You think you\u2019ll be able to do it, but sometimes doesn\u2019t work. And sometimes it works perfectly, as we\u2019ve seen in Counter-Strike, notably. You can try to build the best collective, but you need a special level of talent to elevate your teams.\u201d ZywOo has been the player Team Vitality have rallied behind, and Nico sees him as the perfect example of what they want to do in Counter-Strike 2 and other esports. \u201cZywOo is not enough to win everything, but he\u2019s a key factor. Our goal and mission is to surround him with the right people that compliment his talent and skills.\u201d When asked further about what it was like when ZywOo got brought into the organization, Nico claims they instantly knew that they had something special on their hands and that they made it their goal to build something around ZywOo. For those hoping that this now-legendary Counter-Strike player is going to stick with Vitality through Counter-Strike 2 and beyond, you\u2019re in luck; Nico sees a future where they keep ZywOo for the next decade. \u201cWe instantly knew that we had something special, and then our goal was to make sure [ZywOo] would be able to contribute at the best of his potential, and also be comfortable and find the right home at Vitality. And that means a lot of things. Yes, absolutely, that means that you treat your players well, that you compensate them well, you know, adjust to their market value, but also that there is a special connection that goes beyond having a good contract, all the right coaches, all the right partners. \u201cHe needs to feel at home, and I think that\u2019s what we demonstrated. ZywOo is Vitality, Vitality is ZywOo, and we had to build that relationship brick by brick. And there is nothing more satisfying than seeing him being still in the same club after, what, 6 years now? And hopefully for the next 5 to 10 years. That\u2019s our mission, he needs to feel at home, he needs to think that he wants to build his own legacy and story around Vitality and vice-versa.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Team Vitality plans a decade of CS2 dominance with ZywOo Team VitalityAhead of ZywOo\u2019s confirmed renewal with Team Vitality through 2026, Dexerto sat with him, as well as both the org\u2019s co-founders, to discuss the now-legendary Counter-Strike player\u2019s history and their reasons for re-signing the \u2018King of Counter-Strike\u2019. He may be staying with the org […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-37222","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37222","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37222"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37222\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37222"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37222"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37222"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}