yuurih: "Our goals have changed from tournament to tournament"

We spoke to Yuri "⁠yuurih⁠" Santos at the Americas Minor after FURIA defeated INTZ to advance to the StarLadder Major Main Qualifier.

FURIA lost the opening game of the tournament to INTZ, a BO1 on Overpass, and had to battle through BO3s to get out of the groups. After a defeat to their nemesis NRG, FURIA took down countrymen Sharks and INTZ to secure a spot at the Main Qualifier.

In an interview with yuurih, we heard about the Minor matches, making Pro League and the Major, and the 19-year-old's favorite moments of the year so far.

You lost to INTZ initially at the tournament, so going into the final match of the Minor, what was the gameplan like?

In the BO1 against them on Overpass we struggled with mistakes, and in a BO1 you don't have the space to make mistakes. Coming into this match that was a BO3, everyone on the team was just more comfortable to play and the only map we struggled a lot with individual mistakes was Nuke, and they capitalized on that.

Let's touch on Nuke because it is one of your best maps, going into it it seemed like a done deal, 2-0, but they managed to come back on the T side of the map. So how did they manage to get those openings?

At the beginning of the T half we started well, 4-1, but we struggled to keep up the momentum, so the half ended 8-7, but it was all good. When we were on CT the communication was bad, the guys were too euphoric, too emotional and I think that made everyone make individual mistakes that cost us some rounds. I think we lost two rounds with 5v3, 5v4 advantages and they just capitalized on that.

So you are not a team that thrives on being emotional like some of the other Brazilian teams?

I think the Brazilian thing about being emotional is more of a cultural thing, we think that sometimes when teams are too emotional, too hyped, that can be bad too. Because if they lose two rounds in a row, they go down and can't get up again. So with the work we have done with our staff we have managed to control the emotions during the game, so that is why we always manage to be calmer.

The pistol round you played on Mirage against INTZ was interesting, five men towards B. Was that an anti-strat that didn't go right, what was the call there?

The pistol round was mostly down to the feeling of our captain, arT. We just stacked B to fight the guys on B. I think we just messed it up on CT spawn, we didn't manage to wins the fights with the flashes so they won the round.

It has been a pretty busy couple of months for you guys, you got into Pro League and the Major, how does it feel now that you've managed to reach your goals?

We are playing a lot these months and I think our goals have changed from tournament to tournament because now we are at the stage that we want to play all the big tournaments, all the tier 1 ones, and do the best as possible. I think that the problem right now is that we play too much CS and we don't have that much time to practice or have a mental break. We are kind of getting used to this, though, playing tournament after tournament, trying to fix things as fast as possible to be ready for the next one. It is just an amazing thing because every tournament that we play in is just more motivation for us.

What is your favorite moment from these tournaments that you've played in this year?

We had two good tournaments, the first one was DreamHack Dallas because it was our first tier 1 event and everybody was just hyped to play. The most emotional one was ECS when we beat Astralis in a BO3 because it was like winning a Major for the guys. It was an amazing feeling, showing we are able to beat them, showing we are here and we can fight.

You are a pretty young player, 19-years-old, and you got a lot of attention in the last half-year, especially with all of the MIBR talk. Has that been affecting you as a player?

You can't deny receiving a proposition from other teams has an effect on an individual, but I'm managing very well. I have outside support, and knowing the team is with me with every decision makes me comfortable.

You've been playing a lot, had a lot of tournaments, what is the plan going into the Major and the player break?

Our next thing is a BO5 show match against AVANGAR in China this week, and then after that, we are going to take a couple of weeks break because of this [busy] season. And then take some time before the Major to bootcamp in Europe and just be ready.