s1mple: "From Antwerp to this Major all teams have become much stronger"

The Ukrainian star hopes the Brazilian fans will cheer for his team moving forward if they get past the local favorites in their quarter-final bout.

Natus Vincere had a tough time navigating the IEM Rio Major's Legends Stage, going all the way to the final day of play in the Swiss group. Oleksandr "⁠s1mple⁠" Kostyliev and company didn't fret when up against the wall and beat BIG in the 2-2 decider match to secure a spot in the playoffs and a chance to play at the Jeunesse Arena.

The Ukrainian-Russian side will take on FURIA on Friday at 21:30 in the last of the four quarter-final matches. Natus Vincere have a golden opportunity in Brazil, as their biggest rivals and the rest of top five teams in the world ranking have all been knocked out of contention. FaZe, Vitality and Liquid were taken out in the group stage, while Cloud9 were shocked in their first playoff match by MOUZ.

It will not be a walk in the park for s1mple and company despite all top-ranked teams out of the running in a tournament the Ukrainian star feels is reminiscent of the PGL Major in Krakow, as they are slated to play their first playoff series against none other than the home team, FURIA, who will count with the full force of the crowd.

s1mple gave HLTV an interview on Thursday, before the first set of quarter-final matches were played at the Jeunesse Arena in Rio de Janeiro, to discuss Natus Vincere's run in Brazil so far, his thoughts on what happened to the rest of the field, the match-up against FURIA, and what his dream bracket would have looked like before Cloud9 were knocked out of contention.

Let's start off with the first stage of the Major, right when you got here. You had a tough start, the Legends Stage was filled with upsets and favorite teams struggling. What was that like for you?

We were all excited, we had a really good bootcamp, but after we came we had a really hard game at the beginning and then we had two 14-16 losses in a row. We were winning 12-3 against Liquid, so after that it started to be the hardest Major to get to the Champions Stage. I started to remember PGL Krakow, where Gambit won and FaZe went 0-3 — they actually lost to FlipSid3 with B1ad3 and electronic, and we went 1-3 with GuardiaN.

I felt this pressure, that we needed to go through, and other teams had an advantage with two wins. BIG, FURIA, they didn't feel the same. So we just said to each other that it was going to best-of-threes and that we had good chances. We started to see FaZe lose, Vitality lose, and we told ourselves, 'we don't want to be in that spot,' because I saw their faces and I knew what they were feeling.

What did you think when you saw the Legends Stage's initial seedings?

I told myself that it's good because even if we lose to Vitality or FaZe lose to Cloud9 we all still have a chance to qualify, we won't play each other in best-of-threes, although in the end it did finish bad for other teams.

You made it out of the Legends Stage on the last day and you're up against FURIA now, the local favorites. How excited are you about going into that match?

I'm just wondering if I'll be able to hear the game. I know they will support FURIA until the end of the tournament, but hopefully we'll win and then they'll start to support us until the end. The match-up itself, we have a good map pool against them.

I think they don't have a 100% winrate map like Bad News Eagles had, that they scared FaZe into banning it. I don't think FURIA has a map like that. It'll be curious to see how they start playing against us, they'll probably try to play fast because the crowd will be cheering and they'll go all the way, but let's see, let's see how it goes.

Teams really want to peak at the Major and find their best form here. You had some struggles but you found enough to get to the Champions Stage. How do you feel about the team now, are you hitting your stride?

I think we're in good form right now. We're getting more and more confidence. We understand that we lost 14-16 to top five teams in the HLTV ranking, Liquid and Cloud9. Everyone has confidence and we know we're stronger than other teams, but still, there's this moment where there will be a crowd, we'll play against FURIA...

Cloud9 went 3-0 and are in good form, as well. I ask myself a lot of questions, how Cloud9 is going to play [editor's note: the interview was conducted before Cloud9's quarter-final defeat to MOUZ], how FURIA is going to play, how the crowd's going to cheer, how we'll hear the game and how much confidence me and my teammates will have.

There are four teams from your region and all in different match-ups...

Post-Soviet Union region, no more CIS.

How do you feel about the region being so strong at the Major and the level you're all showing?

I think from Antwerp to this Major all teams have become much stronger. For the last two months there's been no number one team, this tournament will decide who the number one team is because everyone had shaky results. Vitality won ESL Pro League, but they did bad in the first qualifiers for the Major. Same with FaZe and all other teams, and all teams see this and get more confidence, they don't change players.

We changed a player and our game dropped, we used to play with Boombl4 and we were with him for a year and a half and we started winning. The same thing happened with other teams, like Spirit got a good roster... I don't think they have really strong individual players, but they're a team and their structure is becoming stronger and stronger. Other teams are starting to develop structure and practice this structure, and when they do it like us, even if they remove some player, the structure will remain the same, so they can easily beat top 10 or top 15 teams.

I think that's happening now with teams from our region and other teams as well, like FURIA and Heroic. I thought Heroic weren't going to make the playoffs because when they added Jabbi the results were bad, but since then they've upgraded and made really good progress.

If you look at the bracket, is there a dream path for you if you beat FURIA?

I want to play Heroic because we always play against them at the Major and it's always fun, and I want to play Cloud9 in the final. It's going to be an interesting bracket, it's very interesting if we get this bracket.

Following up on your Cloud9 vs. NAVI dream final. Is it to kind of show that you're still the top dogs?

Yeah, we want to beat them because we lost 14-16. We had a lead, like other teams had, but Cloud9 like to do comebacks. I'm pretty sure that they understand that with a crowd it's going to be a different game. It was interesting to play against them after 300+ days because I feel like they're still playing the same.

Like the Mirage we played, it's still the same, they have two lurkers and they're doing META rounds. We expect them to do them, and they do them, so it's always fun to play against them. We had a rivalry with them before the war started all of the time.