NAF: "We can't sit here and just roll over and die, we've got to win"

"For us to go 0-3 at the last CS:GO Major would be a massive disgrace to our organization and for the NA region as a whole," NAF stated.

Liquid were up against the wall after the first day of play, in which they lost their opening best-of-ones to Apeks and FORZE. The North American side struggled in a three-map series against Fluxo, but in the end made it through their elimination match to secure survival at the Major's Challengers Stage for at least one more day.

Keith "⁠NAF⁠" Markovic took some time after the hard-fought match to talk about the atmosphere in Liquid after the team's slow start in France, which came unexpectedly to the team after fruitful practice in the lead up to the Major. The Canadian rifler described the team's necessity to do well in strong terms, stating that it would be a disgrace for their organization to go out 0-3 at the last CS:GO Major and that they can't just roll over and die.

Liquid are now set to play a derby in the fourth round of the Challengers Stage as they will take on North American rivals Complexity in their second straight do-or-die match.

Date	Matches
BLAST.tv Paris Major 2023 Challengers Stage
10/05/2023	Complexity 14:15 Liquid	Match

You just beat Fluxo 2-1, a tight game at times, but you're still alive at the Major. How big was this victory for the team's morale?

Of course it was very huge. To see a chance for us to go 0-3 at the last CS:GO Major would be a massive disgrace to our organization and for the NA region as a whole. We're just really happy that we were able to get the win, that we're still alive, and we still have another chance for tomorrow.

Your first day you went down 0-2. After that second game you guys were very emotional, even saw some tears it seemed like. What did you do to try and steer the ship and change that dynamic?

I remember after the first game we had a lot of talks, a lot of conversations, a lot of frustrations. Even for myself, individually, I was really disappointing and I was very disappointed in myself after my first performance. We went back to the room and talked to each other, wondering what's going wrong, wondering why we're so bad because we did have a good bootcamp and a lot of the things that we practiced before. We were doing really well and we really confident coming into this Major. To see us start so flat is really disappointing. I mean obviously, we're just happy that we're still alive in the tournament and we can bounce back in the next day.

After the 0-2 start, you got a victory even if it was a hard-fought one. What is the confidence now in the team, or maybe not even the confidence, but is there a belief that you can turn this around and actually make it through?

Yeah, I mean obviously getting a win helps a lot. Obviously don't want to go 0-3, that would be very terrible, but getting a win helps. It just reassures us that we're feeling a little bit better, a little bit more confident, maybe the things that we talked about helped us go in the right direction.

Fluxo is a great team, they did play pretty well, but at the end of the day they're not one of the top five greatest teams. But at the end of the day just getting a win helps our morale, maybe boosts our confidence a little bit. At the end of the day it's great to win.

It seemed at points you were very calm in the server, not that much energy. Do you think you needed this as a little bit of a spark to get into the next game with a bit more energy, especially some of the players who usually hype up a little bit more, is that something you guys need going forward?

Yeah, when we played the first game versus Apeks... Again, I played terribly individually and then as a team we definitely just felt off in everything in terms of our teamwork, our playstyle, our communication, everything was just wrong. Going into the FORZE game, I feel like we fixed a lot of things and we were doing a lot more things better, communication, our playing and playing together, comming who has what and saying everything that needs to be said.

Just in the end when it came down to the FORZE game, I think it was just small micro/macro errors, maybe stepping forward got us killed. I know in one round I made a mistake on like 14-14, and I was like, I wish I didn't do that, but at the end of the day I think we're improving, getting better.

With the Fluxo game, I think we've improved a lot in our communication and what we've been saying to each other and all that, so we just got to keep it going, and like I said getting a win might help us boost our confidence, our morale. We've just got to keep on going, you know, we've just got to win. We can't lose, we can't die. We can't sit here and just roll over and die, we've got to win.