flameZ: “I know that when we head into the Major with a full roster, everything will be fine.”

We didn’t play our game at all in that match because, perhaps, we weren’t at our best individually. That can happen—and it has happened before—and we’ve won many matches that way, but we simply didn’t execute anything we’d prepared. We strayed from the elements of our game plan. I think it was a very bad match for us. 

I think people are adapting to us more now, and that also gives us an opportunity because it’s a map where we know how to play. But we need to punish them for it, and lately we haven’t been doing that.

Chinese teams used to play like crazy. They were very individualistic: they wanted to get headshots, they wanted to pick fights. But now they’re much more structured. They have a lot more strategies, a lot more plays that are set in stone and coordinated among the players. When I used to play for OG, we’d face Chinese teams and could start preparing a day before the match because we knew it would be a damn tough game. But now, when you start preparing to face them, it’s a little different: they play a version of CS that’s much more like what we play every day in Europe. Back then, it was incredibly tough because you were preparing for a completely different game.

I know that when we head into a Major with our full roster, everything will be fine. But there’s definitely this aspect: we need to perform well at tournaments where all five of us are playing together. Because if we go to a Major and don’t get good results, and we don’t earn enough VRS points, that means we’re also not performing well in terms of our achievements. We’re not making it to the semifinals, we’re not making it to the playoffs we need to reach, and that really takes a toll on our confidence. <...> This tournament is especially important, particularly in Paris, on home soil for the French. We need to perform well here and also navigate the rest of the season so we don’t completely fall apart in tournaments with our full roster. But, of course, this season is a bit complicated because our preparation keeps getting interrupted: you play with one player, then preparation stops again, then another player. One of them is your IGL, and that’s a major factor that changes the game. So, of course, we need to step up our game at these tournaments.