The young man from Belarus Alexei 'Cypher' Yanushevsky who tore up the Quake 3 world in 2008 has overcome his struggles and returned to the top of the mountain by winning the IEM IV European Championship Finals. In the final series he faced off against his friend and serious-gaming team-mate Maciej 'av3k' Krzykowski in a nail-biting 5 map affair which went all the way down to a final kill a number of times, most importantly on the final map.

Alexei 'Cypher' Yanushevsky 3:2 Maciej 'av3k' Krzykowski (ztn - 8:1, t7 - 7:9, t9 - 6:7, dm6 - 10:9, dm13 - 6:4)

As the scores suggest this series was painfully close and provided a ton of drama for those pulling for either side, in seemingly every map and major item battle.

The first map saw Cypher take an early but not huge lead on ztn and then play impressively out of control, doing damage and biding his time for the moment to strike and attempt to take back the game. This would be the overall theme of the series and whenever av3k took control he would very quickly run up the frags but Cypher would either use amazing rocket play or ungodly lightning gun accuracy to even up battles or keep himself just ahead. On dm6 av3k was literally one shot away from winning the entire series against a Cypher who was in lg room, but the timer hit zero and the fifth map rolled around.

On the 5th map Cypher got back into the game and hmself a lead and then managed to dodge and hide just long enough to force av3k into a situation which could give the man from Belarus the title. The luck or good decision making which had been on av3k's side in the Cooller series was firmly on Cypher's side when it mattered in the final.

Never before have the top 3 spots for a tournament been this hotly contested, where a single frag in almost all the maps of the key games were the difference. Cypher came out on top and takes home the platter as well as the renewed confidence in his game that he can be the best Quake player in the world when his aim is on and playing at his peak in terms of his decision making.

IEM IV European Championship Finals placings:
1st: Alexei 'Cypher' Yanushevsky $3,500 (+ 1 slot for the World Championship Finals)
2nd: Maciej 'av3k' Krzykowski $1,500 (+ 1 slot for the World Championship Finals)
3rd: Anton 'Cooller' Singov $1,000 (+ 1 slot for the World Championship Finals)
4th: Kevin 'Strenx' Baeza $700 (+ 1 slot for the World Championship Finals)
5th: Magnus 'fox' Olsson $450 (+ 1 slot for the World Championship Finals)
6th: Alessandro 'stermy' Avallone $350 (+ 1 slot for the World Championship Finals)
7th: Benjamin 'calipt' Jakob $300
8th: Marcel 'k1llsen' Paul $200
9-12th: Richard 'noctis' Gansterer $125
9-12th: Pierre-E 'l1nkje' Portier $125
9-12th: Alexander 'Z4muZ' Ihrfors $125
9-12th: Sebastian 'Spart1e' Siira $125
13-16th: Romain 'Dem0n' Leclercq $125
13-16th: Dan 'zsx' Sanders $125
13-16th: Jeffrey 'draven' Debipersad $125
13-16th: Gareth 'GaRpY' Marshall $125

(Photography copyright of ESL/Julia Christophers)