OG have just completed a rebuild, bringing in hotly-touted youngsters F1KU and Adam “NEOFRAG” Zouhar in a change of philosophy from the previous roster.
Their first campaign at a big event took a blow as Mateusz “mantuu” Wilczewski was forced to withdraw through sickness, being replaced by Abdul “degster” Gasanov, but the team have shattered expectations by beating Natus Vincere and ENCE to make the semi-finals.
F1KU has had a dream start with his new team
Fresh from defeating world #3 ENCE, F1KU took some time with HLTV to talk about that match, how the team has pieced together their current style, and how he felt about Nemanja “nexa” Isaković‘s recent comments.
Congratulations on another great win, did you expect to be beating teams like this so soon?
Obviously, yeah of course!
Full confidence?
Yes.
Talking about the game specifically, on the Dust2 T side you lost a few rounds to time, what do you think that was down to, communication?
I don’t really remember the maps that I play because I am focusing on it round by round, I am not thinking about what has just happened so I am not getting tilted, they are not in my mind. It’s hard to say for me, I would have to watch the game.
Speaking more generally, why was the Dust2 so strong, is it maybe easier for you guys to play as a more puggy map?
I think we were strong on Dust2 from the first pracs, we are feeling comfortable on this map, especially degster, so we are happy. You could see that he was peeking long non-stop, giving really valuable information, and of course nexa is using it absolutely perfectly.
…on B I have a free hand and NEOFRAG has a free hand on A because we used to play these positions and OG believes in us.
Moving on to Vertigo, it’s a map that OG previously didn’t play, but you and NEOFRAG did play it with your previous teams. Were you bringing ideas on that map?
Yes, we were, on B I have a free hand and NEOFRAG has a free hand on A because we used to play these positions and OG believes in us. I am really happy that they are believing in what we are doing, and hopefully it’s going to be working as much as it’s working right now.
I want to talk about the T-side pistol specifically, as you pulled off a very clean double-fake. Who called that?
That’s a legendary pistol of NEOFRAG, from SINNERS. We are praccing this since we joined because we were like “what pistol are we gonna play?”, because you know how it is, we have no preparation. We were just playing from the ideas that we used to play in our previous teams, and NEO said “GUYS GUYS GUYS, I HAVE A PISTOL WITH 100% WINRATE!” and then we’re like finally “okay okay, let’s go let’s do it” (laughs).
It seems you guys have a great atmosphere and relationships within the team, is that a key part of being so successful so soon?
I think that in every team atmosphere is the key to success, when you have no atmosphere you don’t want to play CS. You play with the closest people to you because you are spending with them the most time that you have in your life, so I think the atmosphere is really important.
The player break is coming, I think the goals will be set after then.
You mentioned getting a free hand on Vertigo, in general the style has seemed fairly loose so far, will that continue?
I think we’ll get some specific setups if we get some problems with the tactics or something, for example we are taking mid control and then we don’t know how to position. Then maybe we will do specific setups, but right now I think this, like I am calling on B on Vertigo what we are going to do, it’s working right now so I think we are going to keep it.
If something goes wrong, we will do some fixes.
nexa mentioned an interview with HLTV that you and NEOFRAG were what OG could get for what they could afford, did you see it?
(nods)
The names that have been mentioned as the first options were jks and YEKINDAR. Do you care at all that maybe you weren’t the first choice?
No.
Not at all?
(shakes head)
Fair enough. One last question: have you set any goals yet with OG?
To be honest we didn’t have the time for it, we wanted to play Dubai for full preparation for BLAST, and then unfortunately mantuu got sick. The player break is coming, I think the goals will be set after then.
