xelos: "I think we can win"

Team Sweden kicked off the tournament with an upset, beating Denmark 16-14 on Mirage even though the Danish players dominated the scoreboard. Following that match, the Swedes dealt with Singapore 16-8 and kept their record clean by defeating France 16-11 on Train.

Jerry "⁠xelos⁠" Råberg talked to us about the format, his team and what they expect from the tournament.

Lets start with some general talk about the tournament, it's TWC, which means only national teams that is a bit different from most tournaments. So, what do you like, what do you dislike, anything you'd like to comment about the competition?

I like that you play all teams and are guaranteed to play a minumum of nine maps, because before you would have teams come here from afar, play two maps and they are out. I think that's good, and the organizers have been super friendly so I have nothing bad to say so far.

Talking about your team - Team Sweden, historically one of the biggest CS nations, some people were dissapointed with the lineup you brought here, even though it was obvious that some the more famous players couldn't attend due to team obligations. But how did these five players come together, this five-man roster?

The manager Zitron contacted me about playing and I said yes of course. We needed an AWP, so we took Delpan, and slap was already in the roster, so he was in too. He recommended atter, who is a huge talent, and then we all know maektig and that he is really good, but he hasn't got exposure yet.

With this roster, we were thinking that we want to take people that want to be here an have the motivation to play, not just players that want to come and have fun.

Did you prepare for the LAN, here or from home?

We tried to play a bit when we got here, but we didn't get any good practice in. But we talked about how we want to play, what we want to do and how things should go.

So you are 3-0 for the day and you started by beating Denmark, one of the favorites for the tournament. Talk me through that match - you started strong, they came back but you managed to close it 16-14 in the end...

Yeah, we had a strong start but it was kinda rough when we swapped to CT. We played too passive, we didn't play together. So we changed that later in the match, started playing more aggresive and together, the communication was up and we never gave up.

So you played three maps; do you feel your team is clicking more now, is the communication better, do you think you will be better in the playoffs than when you started? Adding to that, how do you think you can place in the tournament?

I think that the win over Denmark was needed for us, because we practiced a bit online but it didn't go well - so beating them gave us a confidence boost. About the placing, if we play like we did today, if we all communicate good, I think we can win the tournament.

In that case, who do you think will be the hardest challenge in the playoffs?

Even though we beat them, I still think Denmark will be the toughest challenge.

Professeur writes for HLTV and can be found on Twitter.