A few days [[link]] ago at the Blast.TV Major, esports teams G2 and Vitality went head-to-head on Nuke in Counter-Strike Global Offensive. It turned out to be a great match, with Vitality eventually emerging the victors with a 16-13 scoreline, but the highlight came in the fifteenth round after G2 had planted A site and took out four Vitality players. Left on his lonesome with an AWP, Vitality's Zyw0o decided it was time to kick things up a notch.
The clip can be seen below. As this [[link]] was the last round of the half Zyw0o had nothing to lose, and produces a spectacular clutch retake: First taking out a G2 player hiding up in heaven, before silently dropping down to the site and picking off the G2 players one-by-one with pinpoint shots and utility mindgames.
Plays like this are rare indeed and one of the reasons CS:GO is such a great spectator sport, and the crowd in France clearly loved it. This Major, which will be the last for CS:GO before it's superseded by Counter-Strike 2 this summer, is being hosted in Paris, and the official Counter-Strike account riffed on this with a simple suggestion: "Put this play in the Louvre".
Put this play in the Louvre. 🇫🇷 https://t.co/rjddxAIF8aMay 13, 2023
'Put it in the Louvre' is somewhere between an idiom and a meme, used in all sorts of [[link]] contexts to indicate something is of such exceptional quality it should be on display in one of the world's most iconic museums. In this case, however, the North American Counter-Strike organisation Dust2.us decided to take Valve at its word, and rather brilliantly 'exhibited' the play right in front of the Mona Lisa.
We put it in the Louvre, @CounterStrike. pic.twitter.com/J4djv7JjOJMay 14, 2023
And, y'know, after watching this clip, maybe we've finally worked out why the lady is smiling. The cherry on the cake here is that this is a Paris Major, Vitality is a Parisian team, and Zyw0o is a Frenchman widely regarded as one of if not the best CS:GO players in the world (and in one of those cosmic twists of fate, was born on the same day Counter-Strike released). Vitality have qualified for the next phase of the Paris Major, and there will surely be the sense among this team that the fates are aligning.