FaZe star Nikola "⁠NiKo⁠" Kovač is the winner of the Most Valuable Player (MVP) award of ESL One Belo Horizonte by HLTV.org and betway.

The Bosnian prodigy beat off competition from teammate Ladislav "⁠GuardiaN⁠" Kovács and from mousesports' Chris "⁠chrisJ⁠" de Jong in a very close race for the prize after leading FaZe to a hard-fought 3-2 victory in the final with a 1.40 rating/+45 KDD.

NiKo led the tournament charts with an average 1.39 rating - his highest at a Big Event in 2018. He ended all 12 maps that he played with above-average ratings, topping the scoreboard for his team in two series and finishing just behind GuardiaN in the other two.

NiKo wins his third MVP medal

Besides leading in rating, NiKo was the best performing player in nine categories, including damage difference per round (+25.7), kills per round (0.88) and percentage of rounds with at least one kill (56.5%). He also features in the top five in four other stats categories, most notably ADR (90,4) and opening kills (35).

This is NiKo's first MVP of the year, his third overall after previously scooping the honour at ESL One New York and SL i-League StarSeries Season 3.