Spinx: “On CT-side Mirage the team wanted me to be kind of an IGL”

Vitality have impressed since adding Spinx in the off-season, storming to victory at ESL Pro League before securing their place in Rio with a 3-1 record, recording wins over FANTASY, Monte and MOUZ.

There was plenty of hype accompanying Spinx‘s arrival in Vitality, with the general consensus being that Mathieu “⁠ZywOo⁠” Herbaut finally had the supporting cast he needed, and so far results have backed up that assessment.

Having just secured their place at the next Major Spinx sat down for a chat with HLTV about Vitality‘s impressive form since his addition, how he has settled into a new position, and the big difference between playing with ENCE and Vitality.

How does it feel to experience such success with this Vitality roster after not long with the lineup?

I am really happy about it, we didn’t really expect to be top-one in ESL and we did expect to qualify to the Major but we didn’t expect to play as good as we are playing right now. We still have some stuff we need to improve on, but yeah we just keep moving forward.

Did you talk much about a timeframe, like “we want to be at this level by this time,” or was it more of a just a take it as it comes situation?

Yeah we did talk about it, we said in the start for Pro League it’s a good tournament, but it wasn’t the main focus kinda, we were focusing on the Major and the tournaments after and see how it goes. Of course we are playing every game 100%, we will just keep working and yeah, that’s it.

With you coming into the team, apEX did an interview at BLAST where he said particularly on the CT side you had some role changes, for example on Mirage you moved from B short to play connector.

How has settling into those new roles been for you?

It definitely wasn’t easy at the start on Mirage connector. I think the position is… you can have a lot of kills, you can have a lot impact, but at the same time you have I think the most responsibility. On CT-side Mirage the team wanted me to be kind of an IGL, call a lot, and that’s what I’m doing. I think it’s been good so far, but of course I can still improve. I think most of my other positions are kind of the same, of course Inferno is also new.

What have the differences overall been like for you joining Vitality when compared to ENCE?

Of course it’s just a different way of working, different players, a different style, a lot of different stuff. On Vitality we are trying to not trust the individual, we have strong individuals that can step up, but we are also trying to use the teamplay, kind of slow defaults and this kind of stuff. On ENCE we had really good individuals so we trusted it a bit more, and I think that’s the big change between ENCE and Vitality.

When you joined Vitality, did you feel any pressure joining a top-tier team?

Not really, nothing special. It’s the same teams I am playing against, just under a different organisation, and with a different team. I feel like if I keep working like I do, and keep doing my thing, it will be fine.

Did Vitality say to you that they were expecting you to be a star player? I think a lot of people saw changing misutaaa for you as a firepower upgrade, did Vitality say anything like this to you when you joined?

They just told me they wanted me as a Spinx, not as a misutaaa. They said “tell us what you feel comfortable doing, tell us what is not comfortable, and do your own thing,” that was mostly it.

Looking forwards we have the Major coming up, have Vitality set any goals or aims for the Major, like top-four, anything like that?

I don’t think we’ve set specific goals, of course I think we just want to get to the best result we can get. I just want us to be 100%, even if we lose in some place or whatever, if we just give 100% it will be fine by me.

One final question about you leaving ENCE, was there anything that could have kept you with the team, maybe if they had won a title before the player break?

I think yes, a lot of stuff could have happened. If we had won a tournament and this kind of stuff, maybe, I don’t really know I didn’t really think about it. Could be.