Perfecto a year with NAVI

The perfect year

Yesterday, on January 24th, it was exactly one year since Ilya "Perfecto" Zalutsky joined NAVI CS:GO team. Let's look back at Perfecto's journey — from LANs with Atlants Gaming and major tournaments with Syman Gaming to victories at IEM Katowice 2020 and BLAST Premier: Global Final 2020.

Before NAVI

The first serious team for Perfecto was Atlants Gaming. The highest accomplishment of the team was second place at the IMPULSE CS:GO Championship, which was held in St. Petersburg in 2018. Notably, the grand-final of the championship featured Atlants Gaming and Quantum Bellator Fire, where Kirill “Boombl4” Mikhailov was competing at the time. 

After several tournaments, Ilya has been seen in Syman Gaming. Together with his new teammates, Perfecto was able to make it to the Starladder Berlin Major 2019, thanks to second place at the CIS regional Minor championship. Later that year, Syman Gaming took the champions title of the NEST Pro Series 2019 and earned $ 35 000.

This tournament was one of the last for Ilya as a member of his former team. An offer from NAVI followed, and after several successful practices, Perfecto joined the club.

First tournaments

Perfecto's first challenge as a member of NAVI was the ICE Challenge LAN Tournament, which took place in London. On their way to the finals, the Born to Win defeated GODSENT twice (2 : 1, 2 : 0) and had no problem defeating OG (2 : 0). In the championship final, our team was defeated by mousesports (1: 3) and became the runner-up of the tournament. At the LAN, Perfecto showed a positive K/D ratio and in general, showed confident plays.

A few days later in London, NAVI played in the BLAST Premier: Spring 2020 Regular Season. Defeated by Team Vitality in the first round, the Born to Win had to play against Astralis. Many CS:GO fans will probably remember this match: After losing 6 : 9 on the decisive third map, NAVI managed to win the game. It is noteworthy that until that moment our team could not beat the Danes for about a year and a half! After this significant victory NAVI was unbeatable up to the finals, where they easily defeated Complexity with a score of 2 : 0.

It was clear that Perfecto was adapting well to the new team, but the main challenge still lied ahead.

IEM Katowice 2020

After a three-week break, our players had to compete in the most important tournament the IEM Katowice 2020, the last CS:GO LAN tournament at the moment.

 NAVI started by defeating FaZe Clan (2:1) - Perfecto finished this match with a rating of 1.07. Then the team suffered a disappointing defeat at the hands of Fnatic (1:2) and had a tedious journey through the lower bracket: the Born to Win easily defeated Ninjas in Pyjamas (2:0) and beat the FaZe Clan again.

Team Liquid awaited NAVI in the play-offs of the championship, this was the troublesome team, for a long time NAVI couldn't defeat this team in a best of 3 series. Fortunately, this time Natus Vincere managed to break this unpleasant streak.

There was no time to celebrate, as we had to play against Astralis in the semi-finals. The Danes lost without resistance: the Born to Win proved to be stronger twice with a score of 16 : 5.

In the match for the champions title,  G2 Esports players were only able to put up a fight against Dust2 (16 : 4 on Nuke, 16 : 13 on Dust2, 16 : 2 on Mirage).

NAVI won IEM for the first time in 10 years, and Perfecto proved that he wasn't invited to the team for nothing. 

Online

After IEM ended, the whole world went to the online mode because of the coronavirus pandemic, and CS:GO is no exception. During this time, NAVI managed to play in 12 tournaments. These include tournaments for RMR points.

At the ESL One: Road to Rio CIS, due to an unsuccessful performance in the group, NAVI took only 7th-8th places. However, they became champions at WePlay! Clutch Island.

The concluding tournament of RMR events was IEM XV — New York CIS. Despite the fact that before the start of the tournament Ilya "Perfecto" Zalutsky fell ill with coronavirus and was compelled to perform with a high fever, the Born to Win showed a decent game and took fourth place. 

We should mention the two finals where NAVI competed. In the 12th season of the ESL Pro League group stage, our guys finished in first place with the statistics of wins and losses 6 to 1. In the playoffs, they took turns beating mousesports, Complexity and Heroic.

NAVI started the championship match with a one-map advantage. Despite a solid start and a 2 : 0 lead, the Born to Win lost to Astralis - the opponent was stronger and managed to win 3 maps in a row.

Then there was the final of IEM Beijing Europe. In the group stage, NAVI defeated MAD Lions (2 : 1), lost to Complexity, and in the play-offs, defeated Team Spirit (2 : 0). The final stage of the tournament began with a victory over Astralis (16 : 9 on Overpass and Inferno), and in the semifinals, the renewed G2 Esports roster was defeated on three maps. However, yet again the team failed to deliver in the grand final, this time the team fell short to Team Vitality — 2 : 3.

Successful start to the season

NAVI began the year 2021 with a long-awaited victory at the BLAST Premier: Global Final 2020. The Born to Win defeated the top contenders in the HLTV.org world rankings, Team Vitality and Astralis. Perfecto finished with a rating of 1.09 and won 9 clutches 1 vs X (a record among all tournament participants).
 
But there's no time to rest. The team has a new challenge ahead of them: the BLAST Premier Spring 2021 group stage matches, which will take place on February 4-14.

A little bit of stats

Ilya "Perfecto" Zalutsky has played 228 cards with NAVI, including BLAST Premier: Global Final 2020 matches. He has made 3,584 frags, 45.5% of which were the headshots.

His favorite weapon is AK-47 (1,278 frags). In 2020 Ilya participated in 81 clutches and made five Aces. The highest rating Perfecto showed in games against G2 Esports — 1.14.

To summarize, it is worth noting that Ilya emerged as the missing link needed for NAVI to prevail. He performs steadily and often takes on positions that are not the most comfortable, creating space for the star players in the lineup.

For the past year, NAVI's CS:GO roster has held steady in the top 3 of HLTV.org's rankings - and even topped it for a while. At almost every major tournament, the Born to Win has made it to the playoffs and often made it to the finals. Much of the credit goes to Perfecto.

We wish Ilya to keep working on himself, and look forward to seeing him in HLTV.org's 2021 Player of the Year rankings.