NertZ: "We didn't have a lot of time to prepare, but I've always believed that we can make the grand final"

Guy "⁠NertZ⁠" Iluz sat down for a quick chat after ENCE's quarter-final win.

ENCE have been on a great run at ESL Pro League Season 17, first progressing through the group stage without many difficulties. In the first round of playoffs, they were met with a tough opponent in G2 but dispatched them in two maps, before getting the better of Vitality in a marathon series.

With the win against Dan "⁠apEX⁠" Madesclaire and company,
ENCE have secured themselves a semi-final berth. Their next test comes against Cloud9, with the European combine once again assuming the role of underdog.

After they booked their top-four placing in Malta, NertZ sat down with HLTV to talk about his start in ENCE, his 1vs4 clutch on Vertigo, and his limited experience with CS2.

First of all, congrats on the win. How does it feel to play your first tournament on LAN with ENCE?

I mean, it's amazing to play with such amazing players like them. I feel like from game to game, I keep improving. That's it.

Touching on today's series against Vitality. You were 14-2 up on the second map of Overpass but let them back into the game. Were you worried at any time?

So we were playing a good CT side and we won, I think, the second pistol round. And when we lost the second round, I wasn't worried at all. But when it became 14-10, something like that, I was feeling a bit like, "oh, we can actually lose this game." But I'm so happy that dycha, Snappi, and SunPayus did an insane round at the end. So in this moment, I knew after they won a sick round, I knew that we're going to win.

The decider was Vertigo. I have to ask you about the round where you let Magisk past you on B, maybe baited your team a bit, but then won a crazy 1vs4?

So I knew when I pushed B main, I saw the first guy, I know they're doing a default. And my teammates were dying on A, and I told them "guys, if you're not dying, if they're going to come [to A], I'm going to kill them." And I don't know, we just collapsed one by one. And I was like, in the situation that I see, Magisk is going past like the first box, and he killed this guy on site. In this moment, I was just waiting for the bomb. I left the bomb carrier to go up the stairs and I wanted to make a lineup for both of the guys and I killed both of them after it. I tried to isolate the fights from Electric and I saw someone on CT, and instantly someone came from stairs. I think someone whiffed from stairs, so I killed him. I went down from B, I wanted to isolate that fight as well, to have a good angle. And then I killed the final guy from B.

You have Cloud9 next up. Do you feel confident about securing a grand final spot?

Yeah, obviously, I'm still forgetting about some strats because we didn't have a lot of time to prepare, but I've always believed that we can make the grand final. Cloud9 are a really good team, but I think we can beat them with good preparation.

I have to touch on Counter-Strike 2, something everyone is talking about. Did you have a chance to test it out much due to the EPL playoffs?

It's actually a funny story. So everybody got in, I think, like at 1 a.m. yesterday. Everyone started to play and I didn't get the key. I was like a little kid watching them playing and I said, "let me play because I didn't get the key." Nobody gave me the permission to play, so it was kind of funny. But I really like it either way, how the textures look and the little things in CS2. So, yeah, I don't have the key to play, but [the game] looks amazing.