NiKo: "malbsMd bailed us out big time"

Last night, G2 secured a spot in the semifinals of the Perfect World Shanghai Major following an intense series against HEROIC that saw the team have to step up to secure the final map of the series, Mirage, in overtime. Coming out of that series, many were quick to say that G2's victory on Mirage was only possible because of a massive performance from the team's Guatemalan prodigy, Mario "malbsMd" Samayoa, with G2 superstar Nikola "NiKo" Kovač very likely agreeing with that statement.

Outside of an amazing 1v3 clutch against HEROIC in overtime, malbsMd was absolutely dynamic on one of his favorite maps, posting 28 kills, 96.3 ADR, and a 1.54 rating to help G2 secure a 16-13 win. On the map malbsMd was far ahead of all of his teammates while the only other player to come close was HEROIC's Abdul "degster" Gasanov who finished the map with 25 kills.

This massive performance led NiKo to opine to HLTV in an interview following the match that he felt like hugging malbsMd immediately after that clutch while admitting, "malbsMd bailed us out big time."

Seeing malbsMd step out in his first Major playoffs has been an incredible sight, especially as it has been heavily reported he will essentially be replacing NiKo when he goes to Falcons in 2025.

While many are right to be worried about what G2 will look like without NiKo, malbsMd is showing that he has what it takes to fill NiKo's shows and potentially develop into a game-defining superstar in CS2 in his own right.