EliGE: "Everything's lining up for us to beat Vitality and go on a nice run"

The Liquid stalwart provided his insight after defeating reigning Katowice champions FaZe to advance to the Spodek Arena.

Liquid experienced a sluggish start to 2023 at BLAST Premier Spring Groups, winning a single series and failing to qualify for Spring Final. Naturally this caused questions to be raised of them ahead of their appearance at IEM Katowice, but wins against IHC and Spirit brought with them signs that the North American side were working their way back into form.

Their sternest test yet came in the form of a lower bracket final against FaZe with a spot in the Spodek Arena on the line, and Jonathan "⁠EliGE⁠" Jablonowski and co. battled fiercely to take a narrow 2-1 series victory, sending them to the playoffs.

With that victory fresh in his mind EliGE gave some time to HLTV to provide insight into how Liquid achieved it, his expectations for the team moving forward, and to address his squad's supposed over-reliance on Mareks "⁠YEKINDAR⁠" Gaļinskis.

EliGE, congratulations on making it to the arena. The ending of the series got pretty close, tell me about how you were dealing with FaZe's T side on Mirage. It looked like you didn't have an answer, they were guessing where you were stacking a lot of the time, tell me how you finally found that answer.

On our CT side I think that we were getting a little bit unlucky with some of our rotations. We would be rotating into A and they would go B, or we'd push B and then we were too slow at stopping them at A. I think that we just had some unlucky calls with those, and then after that we just started playing more to clear out mid. After we had mid I think that it was a lot easier to play from, so just switching up those rotations so it's not just like hoping that it's B, and we stopped these things in time. Those rounds still could have worked, but mid just made it a lot easier and I think that's what made us pull through.

Did you feel like you were getting called out in those first eight rounds they got in a row?

Honestly, I have no idea if he was calling and read it perfectly, then props to him, but I don't think that we were making any obvious reads or tells. I think that it was just unlucky, honestly.

Heading into quarter-finals you have Vitality next, a team you lost to in a close best-of-five last time in the ESL Pro League grand final. What are you expecting this time around?

This event we have already beaten two teams that we haven't beaten before, which would be Spirit and now FaZe, so I think everything's lining up for us to also beat Vitality and go on a really nice run. I'm pretty excited for it. I think that their map pool is going to be a little bit harder for us, it's not as favorable as some other matchups we could have had, but we're really excited to play in that game and get another team down that we haven't beaten before.

How confident are you guys? You had the run towards the end of the year with the runner-up finish at the BLAST World Final. Do you feel like you're up to that form where you could be again in a place to contend for titles?

I think that we're pretty close. We're still a little bit not there yet, but we're obviously easing into it really fast. Prior to the Spirit game I said that we were like a 6 or 7 out of 10 maybe, and then this game I think we were like 7, 8 out of 10. If we can just keep that form and fixing things, being comfortable in more situations, then I think the sky's the limit and we should be at that form pretty soon. I'm hoping that we get that form against Vitality.

Analysts have been saying that you're a little bit too reliant on YEKINDAR and whether he's on or off. This series showed that, he had a struggle on Inferno and then when he turned up you were much more competitive against FaZe. Do you feel like that's true?

I don't think it's completely true, but, obviously, when he is popping heads, it is a lot easier for us. When he's being the point man on the other side of the map a lot of times, or with the pack, I don't know, he's the guy that has been super aggressive and being the point man for a lot of situations, so if it's not working or if the reads aren't working from him, then it would be a lot harder. I'm not really sure exactly that we're relying on him exactly in every single strat. Honestly, I don't know (laughs).

Lastly, you just missed out on the top 20 for the first time in six years. Was that something you were disappointed with and do you feel like this year could be where you come back to that?

I was definitely disappointed. Having a long streak like that definitely sucks to be broken. It's also a lot more motivation to try to get as high that I can and play a lot better than I did last year. From World Final going into now, I was hoping to carry that momentum forward from the BLAST World Final, but having a shaky start to this year definitely hindered that a little bit. If we could just keep on finishing well in Katowice here, I'm expecting that we as a team are going to get a lot better, and the more comfortable we are as a team the more comfortable I am and could play a lot better.