Counter Strike 2: Winning the championship with his team and earning his first MVP award, NAVI AWP-er w0nderful said, "I always believed I could become MVP"..

NAVI's Ukrainian AWP-er w0nderful, after winning the Intel Extreme Masters (IEM) Atlanta title with his team on Sunday, couldn't hide his joy in an interview with HLTV, saying he had always believed he could become MVP one day.

In the interview, w0nderful said, "It feels amazing to win the Intel Extreme Masters (IEM) Atlanta title with the team and secure our second championship of the year."

Regarding finally receiving his first MVP award, w0nderful said, "It feels really good because I've had many opportunities to win this award, but every time I didn't play well in the finals or we lost. This is my first time winning this award, and I'm super happy."

When asked if he felt disappointed that his teammates iM, b1t, and makazze all won MVP before him, w0nderful admitted, "Of course I'm a little disappointed, but I've always believed that I would win MVP someday."

Reflecting on the team's performance in this final, w0nderful said, "I don't know. On Mirage, we felt so good, every round worked. We completely dominated them on the CT side, just kept getting kills. For us, it was just a great CT play."

"We just couldn't win the next round, and that round on Nuke was crucial. Once we won that round, the game started to change. We started making good rounds, getting key kills, and that's how we turned things around."

When asked about the reason for his current smooth performance compared to his slow start at the beginning of the year, w0nderful said, "I don't know. After the StarLadder Budapest Major, I felt really good, really confident. But the tournaments at the beginning of the year were quite disappointing for me, but I didn't change anything; I was still playing the same games. It's just that something wasn't right before. Now, finally, I'm back."

Finally, when asked how much of a chance he thought NAVI had of winning the upcoming IEM Cologne Major, w0nderful confidently said, "a great chance."

NAVI, following their earlier success in ESL Pro League Season 23, secured their second trophy of 2026 at the recently concluded IEM Atlanta.

During the tournament, this veteran Ukrainian Counter Strike 2 team ended their losing streak against Vitality in the quarterfinals, then defeated BetBoom and GamerLegion to ultimately lift the championship trophy.

It's worth mentioning that although w0nderful had previously won five trophies and ranked 11th in the 2024 Player of the Year, but he had never received an MVP award.

This time, w0nderful maintained a dominant rating of 1.31 throughout the tournament, reaching 1.36 in the playoffs.

Image source: Internet / HLTV