That top athletes from traditional sports can also perform at the highest level on the computer or console is no longer a novelty. For example, Liverpool professional Diogo Jota has been showcasing his skills in the FIFA e-sports universe for years. Premier League colleague Oleksandr Zinchenko also seems to possess talent in a pronounced way, as recently proven in a match in Counter Strike 2.
So this was the situation:
- The Ukrainian football star Oleksandr Zinchenko, who is under contract with Premier League club Arsenal London, founded the e-sports organization Passion UA in 2023 together with former Natus Vincere coach Mykhailo “kane” Blaghin.
- The national player’s team is currently competing with a six-member Ukrainian CS2 roster, which includes Zinchenko, in the YaLLa Compass Spring 2024: Contenders Stage, aiming to qualify for the main stage.
- On the 2nd matchday of the competition, the 27-year-old was surprisingly substituted in, as another player from the line-up could not continue the match due to technical issues.
And Zinchenko proved to the spectators from the start that he is a force to be reckoned with!
Football star Zinchenko is substituted into his own Counter-Strike 2 team – and immediately shows his skills
This is how the match went: Shortly after his substitution, which was properly celebrated by the official X-account of the organization, the Ukrainian created a real highlight.
In his first round, Zinchenko achieved what is known as a double headshot. As the last survivor, he was able to make the 1-5 disadvantage at least exciting.
But even without a direct round win, his appearance on the server should have a lasting impact on the best-of-three match.
Because after losing on map one and being down 0-9 on map two, Passion UA suddenly turned it around with the Arsenal professional and finally secured the point on Ancient with 16-12.
Unfortunately, the team could not repeat the fairy-tale run on the final map Anubis. The opponent Bleed visibly recovered from the shock on Ancient and narrowly defeated Passion UA 13-11 in the end – thus the fairy-tale ending of the story was denied to the spectators.
Nevertheless, the performance of the team founder was impressive, as evidenced by the match statistics published on the social media accounts of Passion UA.
With a kill-death ratio of 22 to 26, Oleksandr Zinchenko made a valuable contribution in his pro level debut and certainly helped in promoting the still young organization.
One of his teammates, on the other hand, recently had negative experiences with Counter-Strike 2. His account was banned for cheating.
