Counter-Strike 2 analyst Duncan Thorin Shields has stated that Dmitry sh1ro Sokolov will enter the top 3 best players of 2025 according to HLTV.org. He shared his opinion during a podcast on the Last Free Nation Counter-Strike YouTube channel.
Thorin believes sh1ro will take third place in the 2025 HLTV.org rankings. “Sh1ro will take third place in the ranking of the best players of 2025 according to HLTV.org. <…> Your brains are fighting with this statement: ‘But he won’t be in the top three! Will he be stronger than m0NESY or NiKo?’ I didn’t say anything like that. I said that HLTV.org will put him higher in the ranking than those players. And here’s how it will be. Donk will take first place – it’s simple, everyone sees it. If Spirit doesn’t screw up at tournaments. Second place will go to ZywOo: Vitality has a very good final, which will surely reach many finals. And then there is a problem with NiKo and m0NESY. I believe that m0NESY’s team is finished. I don’t know what should happen to this roster… If he leaves, then it is not a fact that he will even get into the top 20, he may not be lucky with a new roster. In any case, G2 will not achieve high results, so it will be difficult for m0NESY to get into symbolic teams from 5-8 places. Falcons, maybe, will also reach the playoffs, but we don’t know how exactly the rating is compiled – are such successes enough for NiKo to get into the top. Meanwhile, sh1ro with Spirit will surely perform in a bunch of finals, they will be the best team of the year, or at least take second place.”
Shields added that, in addition to m0NESY and NiKo, sh1ro has practically no direct competitors in the fight for the top 3 in the year-end ranking.
“Sh1ro will get his stats. He is a very stable player who only loses to the best in the world. To beat him, you need someone at the level of ZywOo. In this, he is similar to device, who defeated anyone who was below him in the ranking. <…> At the end of the year, there will be other candidates for the top 3. Ropz will win rounds, but will he get better stats than sh1ro? Probably not. <…> Moreover, among snipers, sh1ro does not have so many competitors claiming the top 3. He always has an AWP, because donk almost never tries to take this role, and there is also magixx in the team: ‘I am SANJI, do you need an AWP, sir?’.”
In 2024, sh1ro took sixth place in the HLTV.org ranking. Then, the top three included Danil donk Kryshkovets, Ilya m0NESY Osipov, and Mathieu ZywOo Herbaut.
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