Top 20 players of 2022: Three left in the running

14-1-2023 10:40

The best player of 2022 will be unveiled at the HLTV Awards Show by 1xBet on January 14.

The 10th installment of HLTV.org's Top 20 players of the year ranking is slowly winding down, with the first 17 spots on the annual list, alongside their respective deep-dive articles, all announced over the past fortnight.

The final three who will clinch a place on the podium for their world-class yearlong performances, are soon to be unveiled at the HLTV Awards Show by 1xBet on Saturday.

ZywOo or s1mple can become the first-ever three-time best player of the year

With Sergey "⁠Ax1Le⁠" Rykhtorov being revealed as the fourth-best player of 2022, the race for the first-place accolade narrows down to just three AWP-wielding candidates: Dmitry "⁠sh1ro⁠" Sokolov, Oleksandr "⁠s1mple⁠" Kostyliev, and Mathieu "⁠ZywOo⁠" Herbaut.

Both ZywOo or s1mple are in with a chance at making history, as the potential to take home a record-breaking three-peat of No. 1 finishes is now up for grabs. sh1ro, meanwhile, could forge his own path and oust his competitors from the top of the pecking order. In doing so, he would become the first player outside of the French and Ukrainian superstars to nab the gold-medal spot since Marcelo "⁠coldzera⁠" David was last on the throne in 2017.

s1mple, sh1ro, karrigan among attendees of the HLTV Award Show

To see who out of the trio will be crowned the best player of 2022, tune in to the live broadcast on our Twitch channel. The action will kick off at 18:00 and the main show begins a short time later at 19:30 . The top-three players' in-depth articles will be published in tandem with the announcement.

The live, invite-only event will be held in the new, multi-purpose Space Arena in Stockholm, Sweden. The show will have an audience of some 300 industry-leading figures, ranging from professional players and coaches, guests of honour, and on-air talent. A better look at the guest list can be viewed here.

Heading up the awards ceremony is the quartet of Jasmine "⁠Veracity⁠" Kanuga, Mathieu "⁠Maniac⁠" Quiquerez, Chad "⁠SPUNJ⁠" Burchill, and Pala "⁠Pala⁠" Gilroy Sen. The four hosts will be supported on stage by HLTV.org's very own Milan "⁠Striker⁠" Švejda and Zvonimir "⁠Professeur⁠" Burazin.

Building on the HLTV Award Show in 2021, HLTV.org will be recognising several new categories this time around. These notably comprise acknowledging the best women's player and team of the year, alongside dishing out panel-voted, role-centric awards to the best in-game leader, AWPer, and coach of the year, among others.

Take a look at this year's Introduction article to find out who placed where so far and how the ranking was decided.

Damn, dosia #1

2023-01-14 10:40

8 replies

2023-01-14 10:56

2023-01-14 12:52

YEEEEEEEEEES DOSIA SEXY SEXY

2023-01-14 13:53

1. ZywOo 2. S1mple 3. Sh1ro

2023-01-14 14:01

3 replies

no 1. dosia 2. dycha 3. jks

2023-01-14 14:11

1 reply

2023-01-14 14:39

s1mple sh1ro zywoo

2023-01-14 14:41

2023-01-14 15:21

jks top 3

2023-01-14 10:41

4 replies

2023-01-14 11:48

2023-01-14 12:16

Nice

2023-01-14 16:14

nt azr bestest

2023-01-14 16:57

yeah yeah s1mple > zywoo > sh1ro SSDD 🥱

2023-01-14 10:42

Yeah why they acting like the order could be anything else. Makes it feel like they're gonna do a different order just for the shock value/headline.

2023-01-14 14:08

I am not invited. :(

2 replies

If I had an award show you'd be on the VIP list, cheer up king!

2023-01-14 11:11

Thank you, Fubert. It feels much better now. :)

2023-01-14 23:22

Photo is a hint that s1mple will be robbed by zywoo?

2023-01-14 10:43

5 replies

+1 Zywoo's Look says that

2023-01-14 10:44

+1 GOATWOO

2023-01-14 10:46

nah just s1mple go steal Zywoo because he is Ukrainian …

2023-01-14 11:47

Exactly... No way S1 doesn't win juste because of the context and opportunity to feed the narrative

2023-01-14 19:18

virtually impossible

XANTARES TOP 1

2023-01-14 10:47

sh1ro easily no.`

2023-01-14 10:48

will fraudwho strike again?

2023-01-14 10:49

f4tple would

2023-01-14 10:51

imaging robbing a second top 1 from the GOAT s1mple, would be absolutely incredible, never seen before

2023-01-14 10:52

name

2023-01-14 14:42

if he is above top 3 then it is a fraud

2023-01-14 18:53

short time of 1h30 later lol btw its in no means an attack on the show or hltv, I am excited for the show. Just had to laugh with the phrasing

Where is JamYoung guy, cuz his fav player in top3

2023-01-14 10:54

dude, seriously how many accounts u have ?

xseven ez top 1

2023-01-14 10:55

+1 aerial top 2

2023-01-14 15:15

+1 xartE top 3

2023-01-14 18:14

2023-01-14 20:01

device, he had better rating throughout the year.

2023-01-14 10:57

sh1ro top 1! +W we W

2023-01-14 10:59

Shiro TOP 1

2023-01-14 11:02

2023-01-14 12:49

Everyone knows f0rest Top 1 .

2023-01-14 11:07

hltv pretending like people dont know, lol

s1mple boutta cement his GOAT status even more

2023-01-14 11:12

I agree. Although he dropped a bit to less superhuman levels in the 2nd half of the year, he was a monster in the first half... Zywoo hasnt had a bad year either but Vitality's lack of big wins is gonna hurt him overall. Sh1ro will be no.2 I think, he literally carried C9 into the playoffs in the 2nd major and he didn't really have a bad event all year. Saying that, he might have a shot at no.1

2023-01-14 13:58

Zywoo had a bad year compared to his standards

2023-01-14 14:14

wow, what a mystery

2023-01-14 11:14

Who cars about awp abusers real list is NiKo, Ax1le, Ropz, rain etc

2023-01-14 11:20

- NiKo

2023-01-14 11:51

rain LUL

2023-01-14 14:36

Yeah the fact that three awpers are top 3 means there is something wrong with the game

2023-01-14 15:40

Soo when does it start? No announcement for when to be online is kinda annoying

2023-01-14 11:32

It says right there in the article "The action will kick off at 03:30 and the main show begins a short time later at 05:00" as well as the original announcement article from last year.

2023-01-14 11:59

> award show on Saturday > published Saturday yee I also got confused

2023-01-14 14:19

S1mple

2023-01-14 11:45

Having such stats at team like Vitality should be #1 for Zywoo...

2023-01-14 12:07

Hoixi #21

2023-01-14 12:10

6-20 were the intersting ones this year. 1-5 - super predictable.

2023-01-14 12:31

1-8 were super predictable tbh

2023-01-14 13:32

why not win AWP medusa then bro?

2023-01-14 16:33

cuz u need like 14 right? I fked up putting stavn over kscerato and yekindar way too high.

2023-01-14 17:10

unluko :( can you post your list? I didnt submit any

2023-01-14 18:20

shouldnt the trophies count a little bit more when it comes to this top 20 C9 players are very good but 2 in the top 4 and they only won iem dallas niko and monesy didnt even make to last major and they are top 10 i front of players from faze that won a lot trophies in 2022

2023-01-14 12:47

1. sh1ro 2. s1mple 3. ZywOo

2023-01-14 13:04

I think it’s going to be 1. S1mple 2.sh1ro 3. Zywoo

2023-01-14 13:06

Karrigan must be top 3 his attending the show

2023-01-14 13:08

Lmao I thought the same

2023-01-14 13:37

Why do they spoil that top 3 narrows down to sh1ro, s1mple, zywoo?

2023-01-14 13:22

cuz it's obvious lol?

2023-01-14 13:33

It wasn’t even debatable

2023-01-14 13:35

It’s literally obvious if You watched CS in 2022

2023-01-14 13:36

Striker said already at the summer break that S1mple will be no1 this year, so no point teasing that. Zywoo vs Shiro is closer.

2023-01-14 13:48

Well after summer break s1mple dropped down to below 1.20 rating while zywoo had above 1.30 ratings. But Iem China got canceled , Vitality failed qualify for blast fall and failing miserably in major and blast worlds ended zywoos chances

Yeah but the sentiment was already in summer that S1mple may play like shit and he would still be no1. And he didn't play bad, only worse than his usual.

2023-01-14 14:57

Not really. S1mple could have still won mvps and evps. Zywoo had mvp from EPL. But if he won major mvp and blast evps and then he definitely could have won top 1. Main thing that hurt zywoo this year is lack of playoffs. Just 2. But when he reached playoffs , he reached finals and was mvp in 1 and the second best player in the other while losing.

2023-01-14 15:09

You may think that. I trust Strikers words more.

2023-01-14 17:34

well sticker is not really the one is deciding top 1. its a group. do you really think s1mple would have got top 1 if zywoo won the mvps of major, blast fall and blast worlds along with the eplmvp. in that case zywoo is with 4 mvps + 3 evps and s1mple with 2 mvps and 3-4 evps. it was not set it stone at all during summer break. last year maybe since s1mple already won like 4-5 mvps by the break. this yea he won only 2.

2023-01-14 17:56

sh1ro > s1mple zywoo > all players

2023-01-14 13:52

no way s1mple isnt number 1

2023-01-14 13:59

ZywOo S1mple Sh1ro

2023-01-14 14:00

S1mple ZywOo Sh1ro

2023-01-14 14:04

gl hf

2023-01-14 14:05

#1 s1mple: best player of the first half of the year. #2 ZywOo: best player of the second half of the year. #3 Shiro: Most consistent AWP of the year.

2023-01-14 14:23

sh0ro is obviously #3 due to lack of impact, you can farm stats forever but gambit sets him up for success, mostly due to hobbit and axile who are just as important. overall I think s1 will take it based on the most common metrics. but if you are looking at the player that performed the best relative to his team then no question who carried hardest. if zywoo had teammates on the level of the other two he would win everything.

2023-01-14 14:24

FalleN, coldzera or fnx? Braziloan domination

2023-01-14 14:35

If not S1mple nr1 the ranking is rigged and used to make money

2023-01-14 14:44

s1mple will win and gg to him, but zywoo should get a special reward for playing in a team with Apex and having this rating, its 85% of the time 4 v 5

2023-01-14 14:45