At number 13 we have the only player of our Top 20 of 2010 list whose team didn't achieve anything noteworthy last year, but even despite that he played extraordinarily well. Christophe "sixeR" Xia is one of the biggest talents out there and he proved that during 2010 while playing for three different organizations.

Basic information

Player: Christophe "sixeR" Xia
Teams: Millenium, BURNING!, Electronic Sahara
Age: 19

Team achievements in 2010:

1st - EPS France 9
2nd - EPS France 8

Stats from major LAN tournaments in 2010:

Kills per round: 0.81
Deaths per round: 0.62
Rating: 1.23 (?)
Maps played: 32
MoM: 9 times top rated in a match
Best tournament: ESWC 2010
Best map: de_dust2
Most notable stat: 3rd best rating of all players (1.23)

In May 2008 the French organization Millenium signed a team that until then represented Get2Gev and Christophe "sixeR" Xia was one of the players who joined with the hope of attending more international events.

In 2009, after two lineup changes, Millenium finally put themselves on the map internationally, claiming 3rd place at DreamHack Summer. Later that year they reached the quarter-final of WCG and then finished 4th at DreamHack Winter. Big things were expected from this team in 2010 but they somewhat disappointed, although not Xia himself.

Bad start and parting ways with Millenium

Just before they were about to attend IEM4 European Championship Finals, the team decided to replace their longtime captain Steve "Ozstrik3r" Flavigni with Rassen "Rara" Abdou. That change didn't bring them any success as they were sent home early after losing all of their matches in the group stage. But despite their five losses, Xia played very well finishing with a 1.13 rating, the best of his team, especially standing out in matches against mousesports and AGAiN (future Frag eXecutors).

Shortly after the event in Germany, Millenium decided to cut the team loose due to their decision to replace Flavigni without consulting the management. One month later, Xia and the team were signed by an organization named BURNING but they would not attend an international event for a few more months.

During that period, Xia represented France in ASUS ENC where they made it past the group stage, only to be stopped by eventual finalists Ukraine in their relegation match. Xia played amazingly in this tournament, finishing as its best rated player with a 1.29 rating in 14 maps. He had some amazing performances, starting with his best match of the year when he annihilated Turkey in the first map posting a 30-4 score, earning himself an astronomical 3.04 rating, one of the best by any player during the year. He also shined during his team's loss to Russia, when he made one of his highlight rounds of the year, as well in his team's only map-win against Ukraine.

sixeR's awp ace against Russia during ASUS ENC 2010

Great performance at ESWC

The first international event for Xia and his team under the new name BURNING was to be ESWC at their home turf in Paris, France. It would end up being their biggest success of the year, even though they only reached the quarter-final where they were defeated by Frag eXecutors in 3 maps. Their highlight of the event was surprising the eventual champions Na`Vi in their group stage match by winning 16-14. Xia himself was once more spectacular, rated above 1.00 in 8 of his 9 maps, doing especially well against Playzone.fi against whom he posted a 32-13 score. He ended up being the event's 2nd best rated player with an impressive 1.27 rating, and also the best entry killer and the 4th best awper.

A week later they took part in a prestigious online tournament, fnatic PLAY BEAT IT finals, where they once again fell in the quarter-final, this time to Russian team [u.s.b] (later signed by MYM). Xia was his team's second best rated player, although once again with an impressive 1.28 rating. He again had his best moments against the Finnish team Playzone, which however featured a different lineup this time compared to their ESWC clash.

BURNING then traveled to United States to attend Arbalet Dallas, where they struggled during the group stages against American teams Loaded and later compLexity, but they again managed to surprise Na`Vi, this time winning 17-13. That helped them to reach the playoffs, but there they met EG who defeated them right away in the quarter-final. They also lost to mTw later on in a match for placement from 5-8th which put them at 7-8th in the end. Despite the lack of team success again, Xia recorded his year-best 1.30 rating (4th best at the tournament) and was the 3rd best awper at the event (0.21 awpKPR). His best performances were in a close 14-16 defeat to Loaded when he had a 31-19 score and in the win against Na`Vi when he had 28-18.

Upon their return from Dallas, the team left the BURNING organization due to problems with financing and they were on the lookout for a new home again. Next up for them was WCG in Los Angeles where they played under the name FACE2FACE and were placed in the group of death with Lions and Evil Geniuses. They lost to EG in their first match, then won the other two against Immunity and Lions, but it wasn't enough as they were sent home due to worse round difference than the Americans and the Swedes. Xia again performed excellent with a 1.19 overall rating, doing particularly well in their match against Lions with a 31-20 score.

Three months after leaving their previous organization, they finally found a home in Electronic Sahara. Their first tournament under that name and also their last tournament in 2010 was DreamHack Winter, where they reached the quarter-final and were once again stopped by Frag eXecutors, just like at ESWC. Xia played well overall this time too, as he recorded a 1.13 rating, while he had his most successful awp showing of the year with 0.25 kills per round.

During the last few months of the year, the French team also took part in IEM5 European Championship where they barely scraped through their group with 2 wins and 3 losses. That enabled them to play the relegation match against RAGE which they managed to win and thus secure a spot at the Finals of the event in Kiev. Xia was the main reason they won that match with his 26-10 and 35-16 performances on the two maps against the Swedes. He was also overall his team's brightest star during the online tournament with an excellent 1.15 rating during their overall shaky campaign.

Xia's incredible action with 2hp against RAGE

Amazing year individually

Even though Christophe "sixeR" Xia may not have been as successful in 2010 as some other players, he performed truly impressively at every event that his team took part in, whether on LAN or online. He didn't win any big titles, only a domestic one at EPS France while his team's biggest international achievements were reaching the quarter-finals of ESWC, Arbalet Dallas and DreamHack Winter.

He was the 8th best awper of the year looking at the averages (0.20 awp kills per round) and the 6th best entry killer. He didn't have a single bad tournament all year, even more so, his lowest rating was 1.13 which many players would be proud with as their best. And if we were only to look at his overall 1.23 rating, he would be ranked 3rd. However, his lack of titles or any sort of achievements with his team had to influence his position, so he is placed 13th at our Top 20 players of 2010 list.

Recommended demos of sixeR in 2010:

If you want to check out some of his matches that were mentioned in this article, you can find links to those demos right here:

Opponent	Map	Event	Score	Demo
mousesports	nuke	IEM4 Europe Finals (Group stage)	27-20	POV
AGAiN	train	IEM4 Europe Finals (Group stage)	31-20	POV
Turkey	inferno	ASUS ENC 2010	30-4	POV
Russia	train	ASUS ENC 2010	32-20	HLTV
Playzone	nuke	ESWC 2010 (Group stage #2)	32-13	POV
Fx	nuke	ESWC 2010 (Quarter-final, map 1)	25-13	HLTV
Ukraine	nuke	ASUS ENC 2010 (Relegation, map 1)	27-10	HLTV
Playzone	dust2	fnatic PLAY BEAT IT (1/8, map 1)	27-17	HLTV
Loaded	dust2	Arbalet Dallas (Group stage #1)	31-19	POV
Na`Vi	dust2	Arbalet Dallas (Group stage #2)	28-18	POV
Lions	nuke	WCG 2010 (Group stage)	31-20	HLTV
munkka	inferno	DreamHack Winter (1/8, map 2)	26-9	HLTV
RAGE	dust2	IEM5 Europe (Relegation, map 1)	26-10	POV
RAGE	inferno	IEM5 Europe (Relegation, map 2)	35-16	POV

If you missed our previous article about Danny "fRoD" Montaner, click here or if you want to see who else is on the list when it is updated, head over to our Introduction article here.

What do you think about the performance of Christophe "sixeR" Xia in 2010? Does he deserve a place in the Top 20? What was your biggest impression of him this year? Feel free to leave a comment on this topic and stay tuned to HLTV.org if you want to see what the rest of the Top 20 looks like, as we will bring you number 12 tomorrow.