The most recent major event in the scene, Xperia PLAY 2011, took place last weekend in Copenhagen, Denmark. It is now time to look back at the individual stars, and also chose the MVP and the All-Star lineup of the tournament.
Xperia PLAY 2011 hosted 43 teams (215 players) and we had a chance to watch 135 matches in those two days that the event lasted. Those numbers made this tournament the biggest one so far this year in that aspect, and even though the prize money wasn't the biggest and the world's best team Natus Vincere was absent, the competition was extremely fierce.
Frag eXecutors came out as the best in the end, after a big endurance test that the finish of this tournament presented, since the second day of the competition saw teams play for 19 hours straight. The Poles won €10,000 thanks to that and finally grabbed a title this year after a 2nd place finish at IEM5 World Championship and 3rd place and IEM5 European Finals.
We will now present to you the best players of the tournament and some facts about their performances, while at the end you will be able to vote for the Most Valuable Player and for the All-Star lineup.
Skip to the vote!
Best rated players
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One of the members of the All-Star lineup of IEM5 European Finals, Wiktor "TaZ" Wojtas, secured himself another nomination with a great performance on his team's road to their first major title after 7 months.
Wojtas practically never disappointed during Frag eXecutors' campaign in Copenhagen, recording a rating above 1.00 in 12 of 14 maps. That made him one of the most consistent performers of this event, and while he didn't stand out much, his most influential individual display came in a very hard 16-14 win over x6tence in the second group stage (1.35 rating, 24% above his team in that match).
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We can now officially say that Oliver "minet" Minet has overtaken Danny "zonic" Sørensen's place as mTw's number two. For the third major tournament in a row, Minet is the team's second best rated player (previously at IEM5 European Finals and IEM5 World Championship).
Minet was top rated in 5 maps during this tournament (only 2 players were more impactful), although 3 of those were in the first group stage where they met with somewhat weaker opponents. He was the team's best in that stage with an impressive 1.49 rating after 4 victories, while later on he was also the best in the semi-final defeat to Frag eXecutors. Similar to the extremely close semi-final encounter between mTw and Fx at the IEM5 European Finals, where Minet was also his team's best, this time he recorded a 1.08 rating, but his team faced a different fortune, ending up on the losing end of this "final before the final".
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It seems that in every other tournament someone else stands out for the Polish team, and now it was turn for Jarosław "pasha" Jarząbkowski. The best Polish awper was their 2nd best rated player, same as during their previous title-winning campaign at e-Stars, which might be coincidence, or it might be an indicator that the Poles need him to step up in order to win an event.
This time he was even better than in Korea, as this display of his is a very strong candidate for the performance of his career so far. The main argument for that claim is his play in the final matchup against SK, when he was top rated with a 1.45 rating (28% above his team, 1.61 rating during de_dust2 16:13 win). He was also the team's best player in the first group stage with a 1.52 rating.
Another huge argument is the fact that he was the most successful entry killer of the tournament (64 entry kills) and the most successful awper (102 awp kills). Looking at the averages, he ended up being the 2nd best entry killer and 3rd best awper, but these numbers clearly show how crucial he was for the team.
In addition to that, he was very successful in clutch situations, winning 5 of them throughout the tournament, most significantly two 1vs3s in big pressure moments. First one was in the semi-final against mTw in round 29 of the second map (highlight), which his team later lost in overtime, while the second one was in the final vs SK, in the penultimate round of de_dust2.
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One of the best backup players in the world, Johan "face" Klasson was once more great in his role for SK Gaming. As the team's 3rd best rated player with a 1.16 rating, Klasson didn't excel, but he didn't disappoint either in any of his 14 maps. He played solid in every stage of the tournament, including the playoffs where he recorded a 1.02 rating, second best in the runners-up SK Gaming squad. In the final round of the first map of the semi-final against RG-Esports, Klasson also recorded a highlight round during which he won a 1vs2 situation to clinch the map-win.
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The 15th pick on our Top 20 of 2010 list, Roman "roman" Ausserdorfer and his team mousesports came to Copenhagen after a disappointing performance earlier in January at IEM5 European Finals. Mousesports finished in last place of their group, while Ausserdorfer, even though he was the team's best player, recorded only a 0.93 rating - his worst in the previous couple of years and the only tournament where he played below average.
Therefore, both he and the team were expected to improve on this occasion, and they did so by reaching the quarter-finals of Xperia PLAY, while Ausserdorfer recorded a very good 1.17 rating, 2nd best of his team.
After a slow start in the first group stage, he picked it up with an excellent performance in the clash with x6tence when he carried his team to a comeback-draw (1.54 rating, 45% above team average). He also played well in their next two matches against Cheap Times! and Frag eXecutors, finishing as the team's best in the second group stage (1.38 rating) during which they recorded 1 win and 2 draws and thus secured a playoff spot. He was also the 8th best entry-fragger of the event, making his influence on the team even more notable.
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The best fragger of the IEM5 World Championship and a member of the All-Star lineup of that event, Christopher "GeT_RiGhT" Alesund, helped his team to an even higher placing this time around.
Although not as influential as back in March, Alesund was SK's best player in both group stages, which is particularly significant considering they found themselves in the "group of death" on the second day, and they managed to finish on top of it largely thanks to him. Although he slightly underperformed later in the playoffs, he still managed to lead his team in the semi-final encounter against RG-Esports (1.14 rating in 3 maps, 13% above team).
Known as a mad-fragger, Alesund didn't disappoint in that regard. Even though his 0.80 KPR wasn't among the best, he still amounted to 5th most total kills at the event (281) and had 4th most rounds with at least one kill (53%).
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The best rated player from mousesports in this tournament was their main acquisition for 2011, Finn "karrigan" Andersen. The Dane has been in great form in the last few months, topping the charts of EPS Germany Summer 2011.
Andersen was top rated three times at Xperia PLAY, including twice during his impressive display in the first group stage (1.67 rating). He was then quiet during the second group stage, but later again put up the best fight for his team against RG-Esports in the quarter-final (1.04 rating), which however they ended up losing after 3 maps.
He particularly stood out in pistol-rounds, during which he was the 4th best at the event. In the 20 pistol-rounds he and his team played, Andersen recorded 25 kills and 13 deaths, helping mousesports to win 13 of those (65%).
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The big changes in fnatic seem to have brought out the best in Harley "dsn" Örwall, as he is for the third time in a row among the top players of a major event. While being one of the most experienced guys at the highest level (playing among the best since joining xP.se in 2003), Örwall keeps surprising us with his high form, this time recording his best rating this year yet (1.23).
He was top rated in 4 maps (only 3 players stood out more in that regard), twice in the first group stage and twice in the second group stage. The latter two were more notable as they came in wins against Lions and munkka which secured fnatic's spot in the playoffs.
Örwall stood out in several other aspects as well, mainly as an entry killer, being the 3rd best at the event. He was previously the second best entry killer at IEM5 World Championship and he is establishing himself as one of the best in that role at the moment. In addition to that, despite being the team's second awper, Örwall was the 5th best with the big green of all players (0.19 awpKPR).
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Following some inconsistency at the start of the year, Patrik "f0rest" Lindberg seems to have returned to his best now as he led SK Gaming to their highest placing with this new lineup, 2nd at Xperia PLAY 2011.
His performance at this event can be deemed MVP-worthy for many reasons, first of all due to his consistency. He had a rating above 1.00 in 11 of 14 maps, while he was top rated in 3 of those, each being an important match. First one was a group stage win against Lions when he carried the team with a 1.76 rating (41% above the rest). After that he excelled in the very tight quarter-final clash with Moscow Five, top rated in both maps (overall 1.35 rating, 35% above team). He also played well in the rest of playoffs, recording the 3rd best 1.17 playoff-rating.
More reasons to support his MVP nomination include being one of the best clutchers of the event, as well as the 5th best entry killer and the 5th best in pistol-rounds. Lindberg won an impressive 8 rounds when left alone (3 of them 1vs3, all in playoffs, one of which was during a highlight round against Moscow Five). That match against the Russian team also best demonstrated his round-opening ability as he recorded a 12-2 entry score during the 2 maps (12 first kills in a round, only 2 first deaths).
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RG-Esports are quite a new team, even though 3 of their members have been playing together since the start of the year. One of those 3 is Andreas "moddii" Fridh, the team's biggest star who already has an MVP title from WGF a couple of months ago.
He wasn't the team's best rated player at this event, but his influence was still invaluable. Fridh played quite well during the group stages without standing out much, but he stepped up when it mattered most – in the playoffs. All 3 of his "man of the match" performances came in important clashes, firstly in the 2nd and 3rd map of quarter-final against mousesports and afterwards in his team's only map-win against SK in the semis. In the match against mousesports he was top rated overall with a 1.37 rating (24% above team average) and that significantly contributed to him being one of the best players in the playoffs (1.18 playoff-rating, 2nd best).
Fridh was also a great entry killer, with a very respectable 42-25 score when opening the round (6th best overall).
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mTw's best player Martin "trace" Heldt once again led the Danes to a podium place, although still not to a title this year. They ended up sharing the 3rd place with RG-Esports, while Heldt, who was voted into All-Star lineups of two previous major events, IEM5 European Finals and IEM5 World Championship, as well as nominated for MVP in both of those, had another very successful showing.
Per usual, Heldt was one of the players who carried their team the most throughout the event, recording a 14% better rating than team's (1.25 compared to mTw's 1.09). Consistency was also a big strength of his, having a rating above 1.00 in 10 of 13 maps. He had several stand-out performances, primarily in the quarter-final against fnatic when he was amazing in both map wins (top rated overall with 1.41, 34% above team) and when he recorded a movie-worthy pistol-round (highlight). That helped him have a very good 1.13 playoff-rating, while he also played great in the second group stage when he had a 1.52 rating in 3 matches, especially excelling against Moscow Five (1.91, 53% above team).
It might also be worth mentioning that unlike in his previous two appearances, he didn't use the awp much this time. He only had 0.08 awpKPR (26 total AWP kills) while at both previous events he had 0.27 and was the 2nd best awper at each. However, that didn't seem to affect mTw's results as they were only knocked out after an extremely close battle with Frag eXecutors in the semi-final. Another thing that remained unaffected was Heldt's ability to win clutch situations, this time coming out on top of 9 of them, the most of all players.
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fnatic were once more stopped in the quarter-final, this time by mTw, after suffering similar fate at IEM5 World Championship to Frag eXecutors. However, it was surely not due to the performance of Marcus "Delpan" Larsson who was again their best rated player.
Larsson practically didn't have a bad performance, as he played well in every stage of the tournament. Even in the team's quarter-final loss to mTw he recorded a 1.14 rating, while being the best on de_train, the only map they managed to take against the Danes.
He was the best awper of his debut tournament with fnatic earlier this year at IEM5 European Finals and his AWP was on fire once more. This time he was the 2nd best with an impressive 0.30 awpKPR, while he was also an excellent entry killer (7th), teaming up great with Harley "dsn" Örwall and making fnatic impressive in that aspect of play. Also, his highlight from the event was naturally made with the AWP, and it took place in fnatic's first match.
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Probably the most impressive player of the year so far, Filip "Neo" Kubski, repeated amazing performances from his previous appearances when he was once a close runner-up (IEM5 European Finals) and once won the MVP title (IEM5 World Championship).
He is again a very strong candidate for MVP, perhaps even more than before, as his team now managed to win the tournament. Kubski as usual carried Frag eXecutors to their success with a rating 15% above team's, along with an impressive 6 'man of the match' performances. Also very impressive is the fact that he played well in every match of the tournament, having a rating above 1.00 in all 14 of his maps.
He excelled in every stage of the tournament, while also not dropping his form as it progressed. His first important display came in the last match of the second group stage against mousesports, in which he was top rated (1.38, 37% above team) and where he singlehandedly secured a draw for his team by winning a 1vs3 situation in the last round (highlight).
After that, they met with TCM-Gaming in the quarter-final and Kubski was even more impressive by being best-rated with 1.49 in two maps. An excruciating semi-final match with mTw followed, which Frag eXecutors won after three maps and 2 overtimes in the last map. Kubski was again the most important piece of that puzzle, being top rated in that last map (1.49) as well as in the entire series (1.31, 28% above team). In the final, his teammate Jarosław "pasha" Jarząbkowski led the charge, but Kubski was right behind with a very good 1.16 rating.
Those performances in the knockout stage of the tournament earned him an amazing 1.31 playoff-rating, by far the best of all players. He was also one of the best clutchers, as he won a total of 8 rounds when left alone, including that amazing 1vs3 against mousesports. Finally, Kubski had the most total kills in the tournament (320) and the best kill-death difference (+111).
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Moscow Five made a change in their lineup after their last international appearance and that seems to have brought new motivation to Mihail "Dosia" Stolyarov. He recently showed great form in our Xperia PLAY prelude tournament online and he continued in the same manner in Copenhagen.
Stolyarov played excellent in every part of the tournament and had a rating above 1.00 in 9 of 10 maps. He particularly stood out in the first group stage, during which he was best rated of all players with 1.73. He ended up with a 1.34 rating at the event, which was 16% better than his team, and even though he wasn't the best rated in his team, he helped significantly to reach the playoffs.
He even played well in their close loss to SK Gaming in the quarter-final, recording a 1.13 rating. But where he mostly stood out was in pistol-rounds, during which he was the best of all players at the event having 26 kills and 11 deaths in 20 of first rounds (1.94 pistol-round rating).
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One of the most surprising names on this list is surely TCM-Gaming's in-game leader, Danny "BERRY" Krüger. He previously never caught the eye as one of the top players at a major event and he was coming off a quite poor showing at IEM5 World Championship (0.64 rating). Therefore, his impressive 1.35 rating at this event is quite a surprise, especially considering he is in charge of all tactical aspects of his team's game.
Seeing as his team was knocked out right away in the quarter-final, he mostly stood out during the two group stages. He was his team's best and the 2nd best rated of all players during the first group stage (1.68 rating), particularly impressing against Moscow Five. In that match, which was a battle for the first place in the group, Krüger had what was probably his most crucial performance, recording a 1.64 rating (52% above team average) and a great highlight round.
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The main star of TCM-Gaming and their best player on the road to playoffs, which they finally reached after two unsuccessful attempts this year, was Michael "Friis" Jørgensen.
Jørgensen has been one of the best awpers in the world in the past few years, although he was rarely noticed as his teams weren't very successful. Last year, despite the lack of some significant team-success, he had the best awpKPR of all players in major LAN tournaments (0.38) and he continued in the same manner this year. At Xperia PLAY he finally made his stand by being the top awper of a major event. He recorded an impressive 0.41 awpKPR, while he was also equally impressive in entry kills as best of the event having won 70% of first duels.
Similar to his teammate Krüger, Jørgensen stood-out only in the group stages, especially in the second one when he had a 1.70 rating, shared-best of all players. On three occasions total he was top rated in a match, each time with amazing ratings above 2.00. The best of those performances was probably the one in the second group stage match against dateam (2.38, 61% above team average), after which his team secured a playoff spot.
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One of the biggest revelations of 2011 so far is Moscow Five's Eduard "ed1k" Ivanov, which he now more than confirmed at Xperia PLAY. Ivanov was nominated for All-Star lineups in both of his previous appearances in major events this year, and in addition to that he had an impressive showing at ASUS Winter 2011 which his team won.
Now he definitely confirmed that he is becoming one of the greats by playing well in each of his 10 maps, despite the fact that his team lost 4 of them. His 1.37 rating was 18% better than his team's rating, which makes him the player who carried his team the most, although he was a member of a super-pair in Moscow Five along with Mihail "Dosia" Stolyarov.
Perhaps his biggest influence on the team's success was his play during the second group stage (1.50 rating), especially against Online Kingdom in a match that in some way ended up deciding that they will go to the playoffs in front of the Finns. Ivanov had an impressive 2.00 rating in that match (53% better than the team), while he also put up an excellent fight in the quarter-final versus SK Gaming, being Moscow Five's best rated with 1.15.
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The revelation of this tournament was without a doubt RG-Esports' Karl-William "kalle" Haraldsen. Among many known star players at the event, including one in his own team, he managed to excel so much to be the highest rated player of the event. Earlier this year, he did show potential for that with a similar performance at WGF, but this was a much more competitive tournament, and he stole the stage at it.
Very consistent with 11 of 14 maps rated above 1.00, Haraldsen showed his best in the group stages, although he was quite good in the playoffs as well. In the end, he collected an incredible 7 'man of the match' awards, 3 of which were in the first group stage, 3 in the second and 1 in the playoffs. He particularly excelled in the second group stage (1.70 rating, shared-best), as top rated in all 3 matches, especially impactful in the 16-14 win against TCM-Gaming (1.59 rating, 64% above team), which secured them the top spot in the group and a meeting with mousesports instead of Frag eXecutors in the first knockout round.
Later he played great in the semi-final against SK Gaming, during which he was top rated among all players from both teams (1.17 in 3 maps). On that occasion he also recorded a highlight round which clinched his team's win in the second map of the match-up.
He had by far the best KPR of 0.92 and the second best kill-death difference (+106). On top of that, he was one of the best entry killers (4th), which he demonstrated against SK in the semis with a 14-4 entry score in 3 maps. Pistol rounds were also something he stood out at, as he had the second best pistol-round rating of 1.82 and the most total kills in them (34).
Note: This ranking is based on Rating (read about it here). It doesn't necessarily represent an ordered list of the best players at the event, but instead singles out the ones who played well in their matches using the formula described in the page linked above.
Top Awpers
| # | Player | Team | awp Kills | awpKPR | % of kills |
| 1. |  Michael 'Friis' Jørgensen | TCM | 88 | 0.41 | 49% |
| 2. |  Marcus 'Delpan' Larsson | fnatic | 69 | 0.30 | 37% |
| 3. |  Jarosław 'pasha' Jarząbkowski | Fx | 102 | 0.27 | 36% |
| 4. | André 'BARBARR' Möller | RG | 86 | 0.27 | 38% |
| 5. | Harley 'dsn' Örwall | fnatic | 42 | 0.19 | 23% |
Top Pistol Round players
| # | Player | Team | PR KPR | PR DPR | PR Rating |
| 1. |  Mihail 'Dosia' Stolyarov | M5 | 1.30 | 0.55 | 1.94 |
| 2. |  Karl-William 'kalle' Haraldsen | RG | 1.21 | 0.50 | 1.82 |
| 3. | Marco 'Snappi' Pfeiffer | TCM | 1.15 | 0.50 | 1.75 |
| 4. | Finn 'karrigan' Andersen |  mouz | 1.25 | 0.65 | 1.72 |
| 5. | Patrik 'f0rest' Lindberg | SK | 1.11 | 0.54 | 1.72 |
Top Entry-kill players
| # | Player | Team | EKpR | EDpR | EK-Rating | Won% |
| 1. | Michael 'Friis' Jørgensen | TCM | 0.17 | 0.07 | 1.53 | 70% |
| 2. | Jarosław 'pasha' Jarząbkowski | Fx | 0.17 | 0.09 | 1.46 | 65% |
| 3. | Harley 'dsn' Örwall | fnatic | 0.16 | 0.08 | 1.41 | 65% |
| 4. | Karl-William 'kalle' Haraldsen | RG | 0.14 | 0.07 | 1.36 | 67% |
| 5. | Patrik 'f0rest' Lindberg | SK | 0.13 | 0.07 | 1.30 | 65% |
Honorable mention
The player who stood out most out of those who didn't make it to the playoffs had to be one from Online Kingdom. The team had a great display with 7 wins and 1 loss, and they missed out on the next stage due to only one round less than Moscow Five. Their best player of the campaign was Kimmo "BASiC" Fagerholm with an impressive 1.41 rating during the two group stages. One of his best performances came in their last match, which was probably the biggest upset of the event as OK beat mTw 16-8, while Fagerholm was top rated with 1.49 (41% above team).
MVP and All-Star lineup vote
We have picked four players as the MVP candidates, the best from each of the top 4 teams at the event. The main reason for that is that in addition to their great individual performances, they helped their team's cause, while some other players were omitted despite their great displays, as their teams were knocked out earlier.
From winners Frag eXecutors, the obvious choice was Filip "Neo" Kubski, who is the team's star, as it is starting to seem, since the beginning of age. Even though Jarosław "pasha" Jarząbkowski provided great support, especially in the final, it had to be Kubski who gets the nomination for his all-round amazing display.
The vice-champions SK Gaming had to thank Patrik "f0rest" Lindberg the most for their success, as he finally stepped up after some shaky performances earlier on in the year and led them straight to the final.
mTw and RG-Esports ended up sharing the 3rd place, while both had one player stand out significantly. For the Danes it was per usual Martin "trace" Heldt, while the Swedish-Norwegian squad was surprisingly led by Karl-William "kalle" Haraldsen.
So take your pick at the Most Valuable Player of the tournament carefully, as in addition to the title of MVP, the winner will also earn a movie containing his best frags from the tournament.
[playerpoll=6]
We will also be choosing the All-Star lineup of this tournament, so go ahead and select the 5 best players in your opinion. Whether you want it to be a realistic squad where each player would have a role or simply the 5 best performers is up to you.
[playerpoll=7]
Just like during our previous votes, we will be having a separate poll for "experts" only, which will later together with the public poll decide the outcome of the vote. The experts will consist of players who took part in this tournament, as well as journalists from other websites.
For more statistics from this tournament you can go here, while HLTV demos can be found here. We will be announcing the results of the vote next week after we've gathered enough votes, so stay tuned to HLTV.org to see who will be named the MVP of Xperia PLAY 2011 and who will be in the All-Star lineup.
eSrael (Group stage #1, inferno)
munkka (Group stage #2, nuke)