Derke becomes first player to reach 2,000 career kills in VCT global events

Nikita “Derke” Sirmitev has done what no other Valorant Champions Tour player has managed before: cross the 2,000 career kill threshold at official VCT global events. The milestone landed during Team Vitality’s campaign at VCT Masters Bangkok 2025 in February, a moment that turned a routine stat tracker update into a genuine piece of esports history.

As of September 2025, Derke sits atop the international kill leaderboard with 2,219 kills. That’s not just first place. It’s a comfortable lead over the competition, with Buzz trailing at 2,155 and Aspas further back at 1,905.

The numbers behind the dominance

He’s played over 180 matches across his career, racking up more than $250,000 in prize winnings along the way. For a 22-year-old born on February 6, 2003, that’s a resume most players twice his competitive age would envy.

He maintains a rating above 1.20 and posts high average combat scores across thousands of rounds played.

The gap between Derke and Aspas, the third-place finisher on the all-time kills list, stands at 314 kills. Buzz, sitting in second with 2,155, is closer but still 64 kills behind.

How Derke built his legacy

Derke’s career arc reads like a masterclass in what it takes to sustain excellence in competitive gaming. He first rose to prominence as part of Fnatic’s Valorant roster, where his aggressive duelist playstyle became a defining feature of some of the most memorable VCT matches in the game’s early competitive history. His eventual move to Team Vitality opened a new chapter, but the core identity remained the same: relentless fragging power paired with smart positioning.

Derke tops the First Deaths leaderboard. In competitive Valorant, first deaths often come from entry fragging, the act of being the first player to push into a site and take the opening duel. The fact that Derke leads both the kills and first deaths charts tells you he’s not padding stats from safe positions.

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