jR: "We still have to gain experience"

The CIS Minor representative, Vega Squadron, wasn't able to defy expectations once again and were eliminated in the group stage of the 11th CS:GO Major. A one-sided loss to Virtus.pro started it off, Immortals had a strong showing against them as well, but the Russian side put up a good fight against PENTA in the elimination match.

Vega Squadron struggled to start well in matches

After Kevin "⁠kRYSTAL⁠" Amend and co. managed a comeback on Mirage to eliminate his team, we talked to Dmytro "⁠jR⁠" Chervak about the Virtus.pro veto and what they can take away from this event.

The first match you had here, against Virtus.pro, that was the opponent that you knew in advance you were going to play and you ended up playing Nuke. So let's start with that, the veto process and how you imagined that going?

Even though we knew in advance that we would play Virtus.pro, our first plan wasn't to play Nuke, it was kind of a last-second decision. We got left with Inferno, Nuke, and Train and we decided to remove Inferno because the other two maps were nice CT side maps, and we would get to chose the side. We knew that we would most likely end up with Nuke, as Virtus.pro play it well. We thought that we could just start on CT nicely, try to play our game and we thought it would work. But it didn't, we couldn't start like we wanted to and then maybe the lack of confidence, when you are losing heavily, it's hard to get back into the game.

Also, why we played Nuke was because we were doing all right in practices so we were confident in that map as well, even though it was one of the strongest Virtus.pro maps.

Talking about practice, NEO also mentioned in his interview that they played against you guys and that you played well. So how do you see the difference between practice and official games, do you feel like the level you show in practice and official games is getting closer?

How we play online and how we play offline, in official matches, at this point it differs a lot. In practices, there is no pressure, there is confidence, you can do whatever you want, almost everything works. You get this confidence while playing from home, online. This tournament, the highest level tournament shows that and we need to restructure our practices somehow.

At the Minor and the Major qualifier our game wasn't the same as online, but it was quite similar to what we play online and in practices. But in this tournament we couldn't show our A game, our usual game that we play in practices and that is it. It's just about getting confidence, getting experience in those big tournaments and about trying to find a right practice approach.

Let's touch on the second match you played here, against Immortals. It was Train and again the CT side was kind of an issue. Was it a similar problem to what you had against Virtus.pro?

It was quite similar to what happened in the Virtus.pro game, we started CT and we were not playing as we usually play. We tried to not overthink ourselves but players were playing safer than they usually play, that gave confidence and it gave space to our opponents. Immortals didn't win the match tactically or anything, they did whatever they wanted to do because we weren't playing as we are supposed to play. Players were like: "I'll try not to die". They weren't doing what they are supposed to do. So that made it hard in late timings, you have no nades and you have quite a few options.

Let's move on to the last match, against PENTA, first about the feeling coming against them. Probably the weakest opponents you could've got, but they use a lot of tactics, play an execute heavy style, so what were you expecting from that matchup?

Yeah, as you said, it was kind of the easiest opponent we could've got in the elimination match and as usual, we just tried to forget the previous games, not overthink ourselves and get a comfortable map. This time we could start as CT, we had a good result, 11-4, but then we completely failed the T side. But the same thing happened to us in the qualifier when we played HellRaisers in the opening game. So it just shows that we need to work on those aspects, not only the practice, we have to fix our Terrorist side, maybe the way we play here. So yeah, we need to come home, get some rest maybe, and fix all those things.

Now you are out of the tournament. What are your thoughts on this, are you disappointed with the performance here?

The result is kind of expected, we came to this tournament, not as underdogs, but outsiders even. At this point, we are not ready yet to face tier 1 and bigger teams, not saying PENTA because if you see the score it was kind of close. We still have to gain experience, and use that to make right decisions in the future. The whole tournament was a big batch of experience, information, we have to learn from that and make the best decisions in the future and progress.

In general, your team, even when I interviewed you back at the ELEAGUE Major Qualifier, you always have a pretty laid back approach, you don't put up big goals. Is the organization giving you enough support that you can be happy with where you are now and just slowly improve, or is it your style as a team, as players that you don't want to rush things and take it easy?

We are still growing and learning from everything. We are just trying not to put too much pressure on ourselves and our organization supports us in this way, so we slowly improve. In the heads of the players and the team as a whole, everyone knows that there is a bigger goal, but we are trying to not think about it every time.

Because it's easy to say in an interview "We are going to come and win against everyone, it's an easy tournament for us", but it's too painful to fall from those heights, it's about not having so much pressure. It might not be the right approach in the eyes of others, but that's how we think it's easier to get mentally ready for the games and the tournaments.