Gaming
Gaming
3 South Africans named in the top 100 FIFA Players in the world
Thabo ‘YvngSavage’ Moloi, Mohamed 'KingCJ0' Alioune Diop and Kaylan 'MBCKaylan' Moodley have all been ranked in the top 100 FIFA Players in the world and all of them are from South Africa.
The ranking system is run by Electronic Arts and requires FIFA players to become FUT Champions Verified players. In order to do that a FIFA player needs to win 27 games in a single weekend league. Once they’ve done that they then become eligible to earn Global Series Points and play in online qualifiers for the rest of the season.
South Africa had 42 FUT Champions Verified players for this season. 26 of them were PS4 Players and 16 were Xbox One Players. Once a player is FUT Champions Verified they’re then able to compete in the FIFA 20 Global Series and earn Global Series Points. They play in a multitude of online qualifiers during the season and also are given the opportunity to compete in online qualification tournaments for various FUT Champions Cups.
Why is this important?
The Global Series is the direct pathway to the FIFA eWorld Cup. The various competitions in the series award points and those points determine which players are eligible to compete in what is, the ultimate battle for any professional player. FIFA Majors, eChampions League, eMA Trophy Tournaments and various licensed qualifying events all form part of the Global Series as well. So players need to be consistent and regularly produce results to remain in contention.
2020 was a difficult season for the Global Series. The Covid-19 pandemic forced EA to cancel many of their physical events. As such, EA made the call to hold the current rankings, from various online competitions and weekly games. The publisher has now released the official top 100 best FIFA players in the world rankings, according to the Golden Series points.
The top ranking South African on Playstation 4 was Thabo “YvngSavage” Moloi. YvngSavage finished 73rd in the world and was the highest ranked South African on PS4. The Goliath Gaming player’s rags to riches story continues to delight FIFA fans and mainstream media. He adds this achievement to a long list of 2020 firsts including traveling overseas to compete for the first time and being announced as the professional player for the eBafana Bafana team that competed in the eNations Stay and Play Cup earlier this year.
The second South African to rank amongst the PS4 players was Mohamed “KingCJ0” Diop. The FIFA competitor currently resides and competes from the United States of America, but continues to fly the flag for his home country. KingCJ0 finished 99th in the world and was the 2nd highest ranked PS4 player in South Africa. Finishing up the top 100 local ranks was Kaylan “MBCKaylan” Moodley. Kaylan plays on Xbox One and finished 33rd in the world. He was also the highest ranked South African both on Xbox and overall.
KingCJ0 was kind enough to do a comparison of the Top 3 player rankings from FIFA 19 compared to the 2020 season. In 2019 both KingCJ0 and YvngSavage ranked in the top 3 on PS4 alongside Julio “Beast” Bianchi. On Xbox One, Shiaan “Shiaan1201” Rugbeer from Goliath Gaming was the leading player on the FGS Ranking followed by Ryan Bastos from Orlando Pirates. Both Xbox Players represented South Africa in the FIFA eNations Cup 2019. MBCKaylan was ineligible because of his age.
It’s a great accomplishment to see YvngSavage, KingCJ0 and MBCKaylan continue to push the bar both locally and internationally - no doubt this grit and hard work will reap the rewards when physical events begin again and our players are able to travel to compete.
