Aleksib: "During the Major I had a lot of pressure, a lot of it coming from myself"

After besting Vitality in his opening match, Aleksi "⁠Aleksib⁠" Virolainen found some time for an interview with HLTV.

G2 have struggled to match the heights they reached in their run to the grand final of IEM Katowice, and a disappointing finish at the Major led to a rethink for the international roster.

Since then they made a solid run to top-six at IEM Dallas and have opened their account here at BLAST with a victory over Vitality.

With a game against FaZe looming, Aleksib spoke with HLTV to give some insight into their victory over Vitality, his team's shallow map pool, and his personal struggles to find form.

Congratulations, how does it feel to win that one?

It feels good to bounce back off of a map loss on the first map, and here we go straight into best-of-threes, in a best-of-one this would have been a loss. We started slow, I started slow myself, but it’s a good thing to bounce back.

Were you maybe disappointed to not 2-0 the series, Dust2 is also a great map for you and you beat them in Dallas on the map?

Disappointed in a way yeah, but they knew they are strong on Dust2, they know we are strong on Dust2, but then again Inferno is one of their best maps as well and we picked it both times recently and won it.

These map picks were kind of a coin toss in the way that both teams have the same strength on these certain maps. The veto was pretty obvious.

Speaking about the match, you posted a fantastic T-side on Inferno, and in general you have a good offense on that map, why do you think that is?

I don’t know honestly, I guess the individuals and the style we have, and agreements we’ve made, it’s just a combination of all these things. Obviously the fact that we have a winning streak on it means everyone has more confidence overall, but honestly the map just suits us.

Speaking about the map pool in general, why do you think you have struggled to deepen it? Inferno is great, Dust2 and Mirage are solid, but beyond that it seems a bit thin.

There are some maps that we don’t get to play too much, we play a lot of opponents thus far that share our map pool. There’s still Ancient and Vertigo which have been weak in terms of tournament play, and we’ve had a lack of time, but at the same time lacking confidence on these maps when we play officials. We need to spam those maps more, and just get repetition after repetition to make sure that the stuff we are going on practice we can transfer to the officials.

Honestly, in the end, a lot of this stuff comes down to confidence, and the fact that we play all the same maps all over.

Talking more generally, this year is set to be your worst year statistically as a player. Do you feel like you are struggling to have impact on the server, and why might that be?

I feel like before the Major and during it I had a lot of pressure, a lot of it coming from myself honestly. I felt like I cared too much, what I mean by that is I literally spent 24/7 thinking about CS and I couldn’t get my mind off the game even though I had time off, let’s say with friends, my girlfriend or the family.

After the Major, we had a couple discussions, and I personally am doing my best to try not to use my spare time into reading anything or following too much about the game. I obviously do the job I am required to do, but I try not to overdo it like I did before, and honestly when I went to Dallas I felt much more in my zone. I felt much more in control of my own game, I am trying to keep doing it and I hope to play well after this game.

To bring it back to this tournament specifically for the last question: how important is it to make the playoffs here and continue your upward trajectory since the Major?

We love to play on stage, and I think our players are playing well on stage, it was unfortunate that we lost to FURIA, I feel like they are our kryptonite at the moment. Of course we want to reach the stage and reach the finals here, I know FaZe is a tough opponent but I think we can do it.