sdy: "I expected us to do better, but we're making progress game by game"

We sat down to chat with Spirit's Ukrainian rifler after a day of mixed results with a loss and a win.

Spirit started their Major run with a loss against a tough opponent, FaZe, but were able to avoid going straight into the elimination matches with a victory over GODSENT to land in the 1-1 pool with an even record.

The Russian-Ukrainian squad have had a tough time in recent times, finishing the final CIS Regional Major Ranking tournament in fifth place before missing out on qualification for IEM Winter with losses to K23 and FunPlus Phoenix in the closed qualifier. But Viktor "⁠sdy⁠" Orudzhev doesn't let that kill his confidence as work in the psychological department and good practice has kept confidence levels from dipping low.

You got a bit roasted by the HLTV Confirmed guys before coming to the event for your recent results, but how did the team feel going into the Major?

We feel pretty well, we had a a short but really good bootcamp, we played the IEM Winter Europe Closed Qualifier from there. We lost it, but overall we had a really good form and worked on our communication and other aspects of the game. Everything went well and was really smooth.

The only problem is that we have some mentality issues in the game when things don't go well, but even after losing the first match against FaZe we came back stronger against GODSENT.

You played the IEM Winter Europe Closed Qualifier from the bootcamp, but didn't get a great result, so what is it that makes you feel in a good place as a team?

Our practice went pretty well, the process we did and the things we worked on went pretty well. It felt very right and powerful.

How have you worked on the mentality problems when things don't go your way?

We have a psychologist and we've been working with him for a long time, but the thing is that if you don't want to help yourself, he won't be able to help you. So now everybody understands the way they need to work with him and it's working.

You played your first match against FaZe, falling 11-16. Run me through how you prepared for it and how it went.

We prepared as we always do, with some individual shooting to warm up while our coach prepared the tactical strategy, our own and how FaZe were going to play. Everything went wrong from the first pistol round, two of our guys missed shots from behind and it was hard for our young player, magixx, to keep going as if nothing happened.

But as I said, we're working a lot with him and we also had some good moments in the game, even if overall FaZe was stronger. Maybe not in a strategic way, but in the individual plays that they made.

Do you think maybe some nerves are playing into it, as you said, with players missing some kills they should have gotten and so on?

Yeah, it's the first Major for two of our players, magixx and degster, so of course we're a bit nervous as a team, but as I said before we're working on all of this pretty hard.

You were able to turn that first loss around and bring your record back to 1-1. How did you focus back up ahead of your second match?

We focused on our mentality before the GODSENT match because we knew that we could play well on Nuke, Overpass, or any other map that they would pick against us. We had a strong strong start on the CT side and it went pretty well because we were having fun in the game. We were playing for ourselves and with our heart open, we weren't closed as we were against FaZe, which really helped.

It was the opposite as against FaZe, the pistol round was pretty smooth and after that they took some rounds. But it was because they played well, not because we played poorly. We took almost every round that we could and we lost every round they played well. It felt good to play like that, all I can remember going wrong is that we lost a 1vs3 clutch or something like that, which was my mistake because I misunderstood the situation a bit, but otherwise I can't remember anything bad from the game.

Moving forward with a 1-1 record, what are the keys for Spirit to get those three wins and make it to the next stage?

As I've said before in this interview, the key lies in the spirit of Team Spirit. As a team, as a unit and as players with a strong mentality that help each other all of the time. I think we will get it.

How is the team playing compared to how you were expecting it to play?

I expected us to do better, but we're making progress game by game in this tournament.

How's your confidence level after the first day?

I don't think it matters if we win or lose, our confidence will be on the same level because we're working hard on that and every player believes in each other. I know I can play well and do everything for my team and I feel the same from every player.

How about any teams or players to watch after the first few matches at the Major?

I can say that an interesting team for me is ENCE because they have some strong individuals and do crazy stuff. If you watch demos of dycha on Nuke, on the CT side, sometimes it feels weird but it works for them pretty well.

The other team is Copenhagen Flames because they had a pretty good run at IEM Fall Europe and they started pretty strong here with a victory over Astralis. They're an interesting team to watch because they're so young and inexperienced but still doing so well.