FalleN: “Thoughts about retiring and switching careers have been on my mind for quite some time now.”

There’s absolutely nothing to worry about. There have been no changes in KSCERATO’s behavior; he isn’t disappointed by anything. What’s happening is just a string of bad luck at specific moments. On Mirage, he was regularly killed by random shots through smoke. In some matches, situations simply didn’t go his way. In other games, there were frequent instances where opponents were left with just a few health points, causing him to miss out on many obvious frags. He always acts in the best interests of the team, and that’s what matters most. If the team is capable of making the playoffs and winning even when its key player is far from peak form, that’s an excellent sign. When he returns to his usual level, we’ll become even stronger.

This success brought not so much relief as a sense of satisfaction and a sense that our long months of hard work—which had previously been limited to just making the playoffs—had finally paid off. It gave us the realization that we’d finally achieved our goal. Nevertheless, we must maintain our current training pace, as it is critical for improving our results. If a match day includes a late game, the team always trains on one, two, or three maps before the official match. With a daytime schedule, it’s physically impossible to combine preparation for the opponent with a full-fledged practice session. However, when games are scheduled after 6:00 or 7:00 p.m., training sessions are always held. With such a packed schedule, where tournaments follow one after another week after week, a lack of consistent practice quickly leads to stagnation—we’ve already faced this issue several championships ago.

To be honest, results in the group stage still matter. You can advance to the playoffs feeling like you simply don’t stand a chance there if you’ve played terribly up to that point, lacked chemistry, and only made it through thanks to luck. The only match in this tournament that I don’t want to think about—and that we can’t be proud of—is the game against NAVI. They completely destroyed us there. We played poorly, and there was no communication. When we watched the replay, one question kept coming up: “What are we even doing?” That’s not our CS at all. All the other matches went well. Right now in Counter-Strike, teams are very different from one another; they all have their own strengths and weaknesses. For example, Team Liquid plays as aggressively as possible, and if you’re not prepared for that—and their risk-taking pays off—you lose. Overall, I’m proud of our performance in the group stage. Against Team Liquid, I played very poorly compared to the previous days. Nuke has actually been my worst map over the last 20 games; I made one bad decision after another and just couldn’t break out of that cycle. I’m glad the team was able to pull me through at that moment. Things went a little better on Inferno, but still not as well as on the other maps. Nevertheless, personally, I feel like I’m helping the team. We’re heading into the playoffs with a real chance to win this championship.

To be honest, I was faced with a choice of exactly how to proceed. There’s a scenario where you don’t say anything—you just quietly hang up your mouse. That option was possible, but we chose a different path. We wanted to make the most of the final moments of my 23-year career, fully aware that this was the end. It was important for me to make a public announcement. Thoughts of retiring and pursuing a new career had been on my mind for quite some time. I realized that if I didn’t take the initiative myself, nothing would change. I needed to give my teammates and the organization advance notice so they could start the process of finding a replacement in time. I know this announcement placed a certain burden on my teammates’ shoulders—perhaps even an excessive one—but they supported me. The guys are giving it their all in the current situation. It’s easy to spin a convenient narrative about a slump—after all, we haven’t won every tournament in a row—but that’s just one version of the story. I wouldn’t change a thing; this is my conscious choice. Right now, we just want to perform as well as possible in the three remaining championships. The guys have a bright future ahead of them; our team has many top-notch players, and the club will make all key decisions as early as next year.

I think this will be the craziest tournament of my life. Over the past 22 years, I’ve played in so many championships that they’ve all started to blur together in my memory. Just yesterday, I was talking with the Team Spirit coach about what happened in the Pro League, and I caught myself thinking that I don’t even remember which season it was. I’ve played in way too many tournaments. But the upcoming Major will definitely be memorable, because it’ll be my last. It’s going to be a lot of fun, and my emotions will be running high. My whole family is coming to this championship; they’re making a special trip just to support me, so it’ll be a very special moment for me. I keep training every day to perform at my best individually and help the team achieve the best possible result. I don’t want to get there and feel like I didn’t give it my all. That’s exactly why I’m putting so much effort into my individual form and working just as hard as I did when I was 18, when I was just starting out on this journey and wanted to conquer the whole world. I still need to find motivation every day, and I continue to do so here, at 35 years old. And I can already be proud of that achievement.