Ladislav "GuardiaN" Kovács is the winner of the Most Valuable Player (MVP) award of IEM Sydney 2018 by HLTV.org and betway.

The FaZe AWPer led the way for his team in the nail-biting final against Astralis with a 1.28 rating/+25 KDD, also averaging the highest damage per round of all players (86.1).

With his grand final performance, Ladislav "⁠GuardiaN⁠" Kovács beat teammate Nikola "⁠NiKo⁠" Kovač and Astralis member Emil "⁠Magisk⁠" Reif to the prize. Nicolai "⁠device⁠" Reedtz and Peter "⁠dupreeh⁠" Rasmussen had also been strong contenders for the award, but fell off after indifferent performances in the title decider.

The Slovakian veteran averaged a 1.22 rating in Sydney and ended all but one of the 17 maps that he played with +1 ratings. Besides topping the scoreboard against Astralis, he was FaZe's top performer in the quarter-final match against fnatic.

GuardiaN win his first MVP with FaZe

GuardiaN led the tournament charts in four categories, including KDD (+104), AWP kills per round (0.52) and opening kills (72), while featuring in the top five in five other leaderboards.

This is GuardiaN's first MVP award since joining FaZe, his seventh overall after also claiming the honour at events like the ESL Pro League Winter 2014/15 Finals, ESWC 2015 and IEM San Jose.

fnatic #3 Robin 'flusha' RönnquistJesper 'JW' WecksellFreddy 'KRIMZ' JohanssonJonas 'Lekr0' OlofssonMaikil 'Golden' Selim Ladislav 'GuardiaN' Kovács Age: 26 Team: FaZe Rating 1.0: 1.15 Maps played: 1168 KPR: 0.77 DPR: 0.62 Peter 'dupreeh' Rasmussen Age: 25 Team: Astralis Rating 1.0: 1.10 Maps played: 1223 KPR: 0.75 DPR: 0.65 Nicolai 'device' Reedtz Age: 22 Team: Astralis Rating 1.0: 1.16 Maps played: 1103 KPR: 0.79 DPR: 0.63 Emil 'Magisk' Reif Age: 20 Team: Astralis Rating 1.0: 1.11 Maps played: 683 KPR: 0.75 DPR: 0.64 Astralis #1 Andreas 'Xyp9x' HøjslethPeter 'dupreeh' RasmussenLukas 'gla1ve' RossanderNicolai 'device' ReedtzEmil 'Magisk' Reif FaZe #4 Finn 'karrigan' AndersenRichard 'Xizt' LandströmLadislav 'GuardiaN' KovácsNikola 'NiKo' KovačHåvard 'rain' Nygaard Nikola 'NiKo' Kovač Age: 21 Team: FaZe Rating 1.0: 1.17 Maps played: 846 KPR: 0.81 DPR: 0.68