JW: I'm sure Sweden will be back on top again

Since reuniting their lineup that went on to win six straight tournaments at the end of 2015 and start of 2016, fnatic have only once made the playoffs of a tournament, at StarSeries S3 in Kiev. The team's last tournament was the ESL Pro League Season 5 Finals, where they had a good start, but ended up going out in groups once again.

JW thinks that Sweden is lacking team players at the moment

How the tournament in Dallas, Texas, influenced fnatic's confidence, who are the most dangerous team in Jönköping, Sweden, and what lead to Denmark overtaking Sweden as the best CS nation are just some of the things Jesper "⁠JW⁠" Wecksell told us in our pre-DreamHack interview.

The last event you attended was EPL S5 in Dallas, where you weren't able to make it to the playoffs after losing out in the three-way tiebreaker. How did the team feel after that 7-8th finish? What were your main takeaways from the tournament?

We felt kinda ready going into the tournament, we felt it was time to go deep in a tournament again and I don't really feel that we had a bad event. We played decently in the group stage BO1 games but had quite an off game and didn't manage to close out vs. Envy in the MR3 tiebreaker. So obviously, we felt a bit down because we lost in the groups, but it also keeps fueling all of us, as this is not something we wanna experience again, so we keep getting hungrier.

Back in Kiev, Olof "⁠olofmeister⁠" Kajbjer mentioned that getting your confidence back was your focus. What did the EPL S5 Finals do for you, confidence-wise? You had some good games, but at the same time failed to achieve a good placing?

I would say it helped our confidence, as, as I stated earlier, the placing is really bad but it doesn't really show our performance at the event in my opinion. 

At DreamHack Summer, you are placed in a group with Cloud9, CLG, and Gambit. On paper, any team can make it out, but how do you personally see the group playing out? Who will you be watching out for the most?

I think that we will advance together with Cloud9, but Gambit has a great chance as well, CLG I don't know that much about, but they have been improving from what I have seen in their online games.

But to be honest, we won't be watching out for anyone, we are there to steal the title and we will not let anyone stand in our way. If we wanna be fnatic again and climb our way back to the top like we want to, none of these teams should be a threat to us. We just have to go in and show it.

Another thing you have been working on as a team has been your map pool. Have you been able to polish the six maps you plan to play at DreamHack Summer and at the following events?

We are ready to play all maps versus different opponents, I would say we have a good map pool going on right now and I think we can have a good veto in most matchups.

Even though the period leading up to the player break will be packed with tournaments, most of the teams will surely be focusing on the last one, the PGL Krakow Major. Are DreamHack Summer, ECS S3 and ESL One Cologne, in a way, testing grounds for the Major? Are you willing to sacrifice some things at these events to be in better shape for the $1,000,000 tournament?

The Major is the most important, of course, but we are hungry for all titles, we wanna taste the gold again and we wanna get going again. Our goal is obviously to win them all, but at the same time, if I had to choose I would obviously pick the Major above most tournaments. However, we will go into every tournament to win it.

Sweden lost the status of the best CS nation

With the upcoming tournament being held in Sweden, the question about the state of Swedish CS is a logical one. Currently, fnatic is on the fringe of the top 10 and other Swedish teams are in disarray, while your rivals, the Danes, have overtaken the title of the #1 CS nation. Why do you think this has happened? Is it related to the infrastructure and ecosystem, is there a lack of talented players in your country, or is there something else that is holding you back?

I think it's just the natural process, there will always be dips, in your mood, in your performance, in everything in life. Sweden has always been very dominant and has produced great players but it's just time for someone else to hold on to the #1 spot (for a little bit...).

Sweden has so many talented aimers, but what I feel like is lacking right now is the ability to produce players that play for the team. Today, all the players see is the aim part and they think it's all about the heavy skill (which can take you far), but they forget about the communication, about the team play part and they tend to be puggier.

But I'm 100% sure Sweden will be back on top again soon, there is no doubt about it.

Tournament formats and different rulesets are still quite a hot topic - are you happy with how things are at the moment? Do you think tournaments are using the best formats and rules and do you think that the players involved enough in the process?

I think the main/big tournaments should all have the same format/rulesets, and then the smaller ones (DH Open, Beyond the Summit) etc. can have other formats and you choose to attend for those reasons. Mixing things up is good, but I still feel the biggest and best events should be the same, and have BO3 elimination matches, for example.

I am still dreaming about an event where everything is played in BO3—maybe one day.