Farlig: "We’ve only got better with each roster change despite losing such talented players"

We caught up with Asger "⁠Farlig⁠" Jensen ahead of Copenhagen Flames' last ESL One: Road to Rio - Europe group match, in which they'll face MOUZ still hoping to make the playoffs.

The Danish team currently have a 3-3 record in the group and are well-positioned to make the playoffs ahead of their final match against MOUZ, who are already out of the running. Copenhagen Flames may still advance even in the event of a defeat to the international roster, provided that North lose their bout with G2.

Ahead of the last round of Group B matches, we sat down with the sixth-best rated player in the competition to date, Copenhagen Flames' AWPer Farlig, who is also topping the AWP kills per round leaderboard and is third in kills per round, opening kills per round and 1+ kills per round. The 21-year-old shared details about his formative days and discussed the team's history, including dealing with roster changes, the addition of coach Morten "⁠zEVES⁠" Vollan Christensen, and the recent results in Flashpoint 1 and Road to Rio.

You’ve been rising through the ranks with Copenhagen Flames, but where were you before that?

I didn’t really play for any notable teams before joining CPH Flames, although I had had short stints with a lot of the lower-level Danish in-game leaders such as Inzta, TOBIZ, BERRY or netrick. After playing for various teams for a while I think I gained a reputation as a potentially interesting player for the future, and that is probably what made CPH Flames take a chance on me when they assembled the original roster back in 2018.

Copenhagen Flames has been your home since October 2018, and you've seen a lot of players come and go. How happy are you with the current lineup?

I’m pretty happy with the current roster, mainly because it is perhaps the hardest working iteration of CPH Flames I've played with yet. I enjoy playing with refrezh a lot because I think we have a very similar view of the game, and Queenix is a player with massive potential. It's only a matter of time before he realises it.

Every time we’ve lost a player it’s been one that was integral to our play, which is a bit frustrating. roeJ, TeSeS and AcilioN were all players who took up a lot of the space on each respective CPH Flames roster. The crazy thing is that we’ve only got better with each roster change despite losing such talented players each time. We’ve been very fortunate with the replacements we’ve made.

Despite the frustration of starting over each time I will say that, in a sense, I actually enjoy playing with new teammates. Every time I get a new teammate I play with someone who has a different perspective on how to play the game. It’s fun to see how CS can differ depending on the type of players you have on your team.

Have you had offers from other teams yourself?

Not really. I’ve had people contact me and say they were interested in me, but no actual offers.

What were your expectations going into ESL One: Road to Rio? Do you think you’ve exceeded them so far?

Our expectations were to possibly beat some of the lower-ranked teams in our group and to put up a decent fight against the top-ranked teams. To answer the question: yes, we have exceeded my expectations for the tournament. I’m left feeling like we should’ve won the matches against G2 and GODSENT, which isn't something I would have expected beforehand.

Did you talk about team goals at all?

No, we agreed to talk about eventual team goals after finishing the Road to Rio tournament.

You recently brought zEVES in to help out as a coach. How has adding him affected the team?

As it stands right now, he hasn’t really had the chance to make an impact yet. We brought him in one day before our first Road to Rio match and we haven’t really been looking to revamp our style of play while still in the tournament. We’ve mainly been making additions to our play and only fixing last-minute things. I think zEVES has been doing a pretty good job in this regard.

You had some trouble against the favorites in your group, although you were able to take maps off FaZe and G2, and you were better than some of your direct rivals. Where do you think you stand currently in the world ranking?

In our current form I’d say we are somewhere around the top 30. I think we can begin climbing upwards with more practice.

Now you’re facing mousesports, with the possibility of making the Road to Rio playoffs...

I’m excited, these matches are the most fun to play!

Where do you think the ceiling for this roster is?

At this point in time, I think it’s very hard to say. We’ve only had about 2-3 weeks of practice with the current lineup, we have barely had time to work on developing our own style of play with the current roster. In practice it's just been a lot of the old stuff being reused just so that we could at least put up a fight here in the Road to Rio tournament.

Before Road to Rio you played Flashpoint 1, where you got worse results than the ones you have been posting lately. What went wrong there?

We entered Flashpoint 1 right after a two-man roster change, one of which was as IGL switch, and when you switch the IGL it's almost like playing with a new team. On top of that, there was a clash in the style and approach to the game among the players, although thankfully these issues have been mostly ironed out by now.

You also had a dip in an otherwise amazing run of form. Why do you think you were off?

The aforementioned disagreements definitely affected my play, although I think the largest reason was probably just a general lack of confidence. I believe confidence is the most important thing in CS, doubly so if you’re an AWPer, since you have so much responsibility.

A notable statistic is your opening kill success percentage (64.1% in the past three months). What is it that makes you so successful at opening rounds?

I can’t say I really know why, it’s natural for me as an AWPer to have high success in opening kills. I wouldn’t be doing my job very well otherwise.

Bubzkji recently said that you’re going to be the next big thing to come out of Denmark. How do you feel about those words? Does it give you extra motivation or added pressure?

I didn’t know anything about Bubzkji saying that, but I like it. I know he gave me a shoutout on Twitter, which I am grateful for. People saying things like that about me definitely gives me extra motivation. Knowing that other people notice and make an effort to follow my development as a player is comforting.