lollipop21k: "I really think we can go to top-eight, if everything goes well"

A win against world No. 5 G2 has done wonders for the confidence of 1win and Igor "⁠lollipop21k⁠" Solodkov.

1win have been steadily building a name for themselves in tier-two online play, second place finishes in the ESL Challenger League and CCT Central Europe Series this year serving as examples of their solid pedigree.

International LANs are a completely different beast however, with three members of the team never having experienced such pressure, and the squad's disrupted practice schedule due to travel troubles has added another layer of difficulty.

Despite the circumstances and an opening loss against Spirit, 1win have bounced back to defeat FORZE and more impressively G2 to put themselves within a series victory of the Major. In the wake of these wins lollipop21k took some time out with HLTV to give insight on their run so far, how the team functions, and how far he thinks they can go in this Major cycle.

How does it feel to beat the No. 5 team in the world?

Well (laughs) I can’t say we are the number five team in the world at the moment, but we managed to beat them! I think it was because It’s LAN, best of one, there’s hype and emotions.

We haven’t even practiced for a month because of all these issues with travelling, so we are not well prepared for this tournament, but we are just trying to do our best. Getting hyped, building the emotion and playing our game.

You had a fantastic game topping the scoreboards, what did you think of your performance?

It’s really good for me, it’s a good boost for my confidence as I had not a good start to the tournament against Spirit and it was middling against forZe. Now I managed to play really hype in the game, so it felt cool.

Were you confident after seeing the veto? Ancient has been one of your best maps this year.

We were prepared for Ancient, we were sure that we were going to play it 100%. It’s a normal map for us, we were ready to play it.

The squad seemed pretty comfortable in the game, particularly in that second half where you won virtually all the gun rounds.

What happened on those pistol half-buys towards A that you lost?

Yeah, it was a rather shaky moment when they came out A. One time I killed two, I repeeked which was a mistake from me, but my guys choked a bit against NiKo and he managed to hit some shots with the Deagle.

We were actually fine after, we didn’t get disappointed very much, we were just “okay okay, we go on and play,” it didn’t tilt us too much.

If I could touch briefly on the other games you have played, against Spirit your T side on Nuke seemed to be the thing that let you down, what happened there?

Spirit is a team which prepares for their opponents very well, they have good analysis and they were prepared for us. They were ready for our door contact rounds, and they were throwing their smokes at 30s so it was kinda obvious that they were well prepared. We didn’t manage to find another way to attack.

On the other hand it was the first game on LAN, to be honest we haven’t played together for two and a half weeks, after our bootcamp we didn’t have a single prac because of the travel situation.

When we beat forZe it was a rather emotional game, it gave us some confidence I think.

In the forZe game you were 11-6 down at one point, were you still confident you could make a comeback in that scenario?

Yeah, we were ready to comeback because I just said at that moment “we can comeback here, chill and we will do it!” and we managed to.

Are you an important voice for the mentality of the team then?

Yeah I am a rather emotional guy, I am often hyping the guys and trying to motivate them, or saying “chill we are fine, we are good and can win.” This team really needed a person like this, so I managed to fit in here.

Talking more generally about 1WIN, you guys have been grinding plenty in tier-two, how does it feel to get a chance at a LAN like this to play the best teams?

Yeah it’s very awesome, but we had a rough period when we were qualifying for this tournament. We failed the first three qualifiers, and in the fourth one we managed to show our best.

It feels awesome to see all these players, the hotel, all these organisations, it’s good as in our team three people are coming to their first international LAN. Only flamie and I had experience like this, but to be honest for me it’s the biggest tournament.

flamie obviously has plenty of experience in these kind of environments, how important is that to a team who hasn’t played many international LANs?

Yeah having flamie is good because he gives us a lot of experience and advice during the LAN, how to prepare for games, how to warmup better, things like this. For sure it helps us a lot.

For example he came to me and said “don’t play DM before the LAN game, just play bots!” (laughs). So after the Spirit game I stopped playing DM before, just bots, and I think I am feeling better with my aim because of it.

As the newest member of the team, how has it been joining 1WIN? Did you feel like the team had a lot of potential?

Well of course, when I was searching for teams I only wanted to go for a team that could qualify for the Major, that’s the main goal for me at the moment.

All players are good, everyone can kill and shoot, everyone knows how to plays CS, we are very good individually. Of course at the moment we are a kinda young team, we have some tactical issues maybe, maybe macro, but we can fix it. We need bootcamps, some practice, but in general the team is good for me and we have very good chances to qualify for the Major and go further.

What is the ceiling then for the team, how far can you go?

Well (smiles) the thing is there are some cases when CIS teams come to the Major, for example Quantum Bellator Fire and Spirit, and they are underdogs and no one knows them so they do well. Spirit got top-four last Major, Quantum Bellator Fire went to the Legends Stage.

I think it helps that CIS players are kinda random for European players, people aren’t prepared for us, we have our own playstyle and people aren’t ready for it. As every win gives us more confidence, we are sure we can do this, so I think we can go… not first of course, but I really think we can go to top-eight, if everything goes well like today for example.

My final questions will be about deko. Obviously he has a lot of eyes on him coming into this tournament, everyone loves to hype up a CIS AWPer. How is it playing with him?

To be honest in real life, not on stream or in pugs, he is a good person. He is rather kind, he is not toxic at all, it’s comfortable to play with him when the atmosphere is fine in the team. There is no problem playing with him, it’s fine for me.

Also, this team needs a guy like me who is always ready to hype and motivate the team, make sure the atmosphere doesn’t go down. When we are fine with the atmosphere, we play good.

How good is he as a player, how far can he go?

Well to be honest he has insane individual skills, mechanics, aim, movement are all very good. He has some issues maybe with macro things, with tactics and nades, but individually he is insane.