KSCERATO after first MVP: “Everything in God’s time”

Kaike “KSCERATO” Cerato finally lifted his maiden HLTV x 1xBet MVP medal at the Thunderpick World Championship 2025 in Malta — a reward for years of consistency and a pivotal showing during FURIA’s reverse-sweep victory over NAVI in the grand final. “I have a lot of EVPs,” he joked. “First MVP, I’m so happy. Everything in God’s time, you know?” 

It took 2,440 days from his first appearance at an MVP-eligible event (IEM Katowice 2019) for KSCERATO to get over the line. Coming into Malta he had already amassed four Top 20 appearances, 22 EVP mentions, and a 1.19 LAN rating 2.0 since his debut — numbers that underscored his reputation even before Sunday’s breakthrough. 

FURIA’s path to the trophy made the award feel inevitable. Down 0–2 in a best-of-five, they rallied to beat NAVI 3–2, with KSCERATO’s stable impact giving his teammates room to take over late in the series. “We said, ‘boys, 0–2 now, three maps ahead, let’s believe in each other,’ … we never stopped believing,” he said after the comeback. 

A role shift that clicked

KSCERATO highlighted how embracing more proactive, duel-heavy roles (after years of lurking) helped unlock this run. “At the beginning it was hard for me… I was full lurker before… Watching Mareks [YEKINDAR] play, FalleN as an old dog play, that’s giving me more confidence to be aggressive all the time.” 

How the final flipped

NAVI raced through Mirage and Inferno, but FURIA steadied on Nuke before surging on Dust2 and Train to complete the reverse sweep. KSCERATO topped his team in ADR and rating over the series, while Danil “molodoy” Golubenko and Mareks “YEKINDAR” Gaļinskis took over on the final two maps to seal it. “It was very hard,” YEKINDAR admitted. “NAVI is a great team… but something came on the third, fourth and fifth maps.” 

What others said

FalleN on choosing to play Malta and the run-up to the Major: “We postponed the week break… because we like to give back to Malta after they’ve been helping us a lot during the last years.” 

Aleksib on FURIA’s style (pre-final): “They have a unique style that’s always nice to watch… it’s refreshing CS to see and it’s exciting to play a BO5 against them.”