apEX: "It's going to be a crazy Major, I have no doubts about that, I need to be a part of that"

Dan "⁠apEX⁠" Madesclaire says that playing in front of a home crowd could be "one of the most magic moments in his life."

Vitality are the only team at the Paris Major with French representation, making them a home favorite. Their fans have made quite a name for themselves in recent years, and given that apEX and his men are among the front runners for the title, they can surely count on their support once again.

apEX and company enter the competition at the Legends Stage, with their first test coming against another title favorite in G2. Given they haven't had time to warm up during the Challengers Stage, Vitality will need to be at full strength immediately if they hope to avoid a slow start.

Ahead of their opener, HLTV sat down with apEX to get his thoughts about Vitality's Major preparation, their struggles of merging the French and Danish playstyle, and the expectations for his home Major.

We're finally here at the BLAST Paris Major, what you've been working towards for most of this year. How are you feeling just coming into this?

I feel prepared, ready, everything. Excited, a lot of emotions in my body right now, but most likely ready. I think we've done everything we could to be ready for this tournament since the beginning of the year. Obviously you don't prepare for the Major in two weeks, you prepare for it in a few months. That was the main goal for the team since the first of January. I'm feeling good, and just ready to get started.

What has the preparation been like, specifically, for the past two weeks, since you won Rio?

We had two weeks and a half to come to this event, so we took some days off. We had a long road since EPL, with the playoffs, the RMR and Rio, so we took some days off and then we started preparing online in one week just to play some practice. Then we went to bootcamp in Paris since Sunday, so we've been here practicing since then. Nothing crazy.

You said in a few interviews that the primary focus is on this Major. Does putting that much focus on it put way more pressure on you, as well?

I have to be honest, all of the top teams want to be ready for the Major. It doesn't add extra pressure, it's just a really important tournament for most of the teams. Of course it's different because it's on our home soil, but we also had Katowice as a really important tournament where we only made quarter-finals. It doesn't add extra pressure, we know what we're capable of, we try to get ready mentally and in the game and everything, so... Let's get started.

I'm sure winning Rio probably helped alleviate some of that pressure, knowing that you can take it over the line at a tournament. What's the conversation in the team like, coming off of that win?

Well, to be really honest, we started the year with the BLAST win. We lost no games to qualify for Washington. Then we went to Katowice, lost the quarter-finals to Liquid, a game that we should have never have lost with this crazy comeback on Overpass. We played so bad. Then we had EPL, where we fucked up against ENCE. We had a 14-10 lead in the third map...

What we felt from the beginning of the year was that we played some good CS most of the time, but fucked up in some moments. So what was in everyone's head was to not make the same mistake all over again and to try to be sure that we could have at least made semi-finals at the two big tournaments from the beginning of the year without doing those mistakes.

Coming to the RMR and Rio, we knew what we were capable of. Of course, the Rio win, was a pleasure for us and a boost of confidence. Also a satisfying thing that's the way we worked since the beginning of the year is the right one and I think the Vitality from 2023 is different than the one from 2022. That's what we want to show to everyone.

I was reading back the interview you did at the RMR and there, when you lost to 9INE, you'd said that your mentality crumbled in that game. You came and won Rio right after, so what has the process of working on the mentality been?

Our big struggle is losing to lower teams. Lower-ranked teams, not lower teams, because I think that the level in CS:GO is really stacked. You can lose to any team. Most likely if you have the wrong mentality. So the goal has been to think that we have to play every game like it's G2, FaZe, or whoever, and then we will be able to win most of the games, if we play our CS. So that was mostly the talk about that, we cannot underestimate any team and we have to do the same against any team. Either it's 9INE, FaZe, everyone... We do the same.

You talked about your longevity, everything is culminating here. There's so many storylines about this being the last Major. How do you feel about it, given your career?

I don't have dupreeh's record. Unfortunately, I played only 17, but it wasn't my fault, kind of. Once I got banned because of KQLY's VAC ban, and the other was when I got benched from G2 and they couldn't sell me back then. So that was two unfortunate tournaments I couldn't attend, but I'm just really proud of what I've done in these 11 years of CS:GO. Let's make the last one even more crazy.

Vitality tend to struggle in Majors so far. As you said, the emphasis is on the fact that this is Paris and the last Major, but is there anything specific you have been working on around it being a Major? Or why is that a problem, specifically with Majors?

I think last year it wasn't Majors that was the problem, it was almost every tournament except our reign in EPL and we made a final in Lisbon. I think the rest was no playoffs at all, so for last year it wasn't about that. The one before that was with the French team and we faced NAVI in quarter-finals, so what could we do? I don't think it's a big problem, I don't think the Major is a big problem. The last year, the whole team was the problem, we played bad and we were not ready for any tournaments. We lost in group stages in Katowice, in Cologne, at the Majors, so it's not about the Majors, it's all about the team.

Right now I think we're trying to do it differently in all aspects and our mental coach is working with us, we had a really different way to approach practice, the game, everything, so I think we're a better team this year than last year. What was the biggest thing we had to deal with was that we had to deal with two big scenes coming together.

The Danes and the French, we have two really different ways of seeing CS. To get together was really tough. I didn't think it would have been that tough. They played one playstyle and we played a different one, so to get them together was really tough. Now we found our way, we found our groove — it's not perfect yet, I don't think it'll ever be like NAVI or Heroic with everyone on the same page, but it's still really good right now. That has been the big work we've done.

For a team like G2, for example, it's really different. You have five nationalities, NiKo and huNter- only playing on international teams, jks as well, so they don't have like a specific way to see CS as a team. It's more individual. So I think putting the guys together was a lot easier for a lot of teams than ours.

What was the hardest thing about merging those? You as the IGL, you had to work on that aspect, too.

For a long time I wanted to make everyone happy, in some sense. So zonic had a lot of words to say about the way we played, but I didn't feel comfortable. I didn't feel comfortable for a long time. It was really tough for me to be in-game leader and most likely it's even worse when people are saying shit out about you, how you're not performing and doing shit. At some point I was just saying that I want to play my style, that I have to. I wanted to have no regrets. It was all about that. Okay, it's not working, but I want no regrets.

Since then, I think we've been performing better. I'm not saying I'm the big game changer, but I think the guys understood the way I want to play. dupreeh had to change the way he played on the T side, for example, we needed him to take more space with me, in general, and ask everyone whenever I want to explode that we have to run and not give a shit about stats or whatever, that we have to play for the team. Since that we play better, we had the best T side in Rio, and I think it's building up. I'm really proud of that, that the boys follow me 100% and also that I was able to do that myself.

You say you had a different approach to practice. Can you expand on that?

Yeah, some practice was a bit left and right, last year. From the beginning of the year we have specific things we want to try every day, so on the CT side, on T side, on anti-ecos, one-man army — we call that when we have solo AK — so that kind of stuff. We try to have a lot of theory behind that and just like, okay, we have a big playbook, what do we do today? What's the stuff we want to do?

I like to call on-the-fly when I feel something, so also having those rounds sometimes. In Astralis they didn't play like that at all back then, so being able to make a call without having the call itself... Like I use nades that we usually do and doing something else, it requires the guys to have a big listening because I'm going to speak a lot in that moment. All of this kind of stuff that we've been a bit bad on before, we try to work on it.

It kinda tie into the communication issues that you and zonic were talking about in interviews last year, right?

We had that as well. We've had communication issues for quite some time and I remember watching and thinking we still have communications issues after six months. Communication is a big word, of course, it's not [just] speaking to each other; it's about listening, not talking too much, it's about a lot of things and that's not easy to work on it, but it's something we improved a lot. We have specific ways to be a lot calmer.

We also have a lot of people talking in the team and I think in a lot of teams you have way fewer people. For example, we have ZywOo that needs to do plays in the map when he has the AWP so is talking a lot, the two Danes also speak a lot, and me speaking a lot as the in-game leader.

We need everyone to calm down a bit to listen to each other because what happened a lot last year, is that we didn't hear each other. I was making a call and I had to repeat three times, no one was listening. Obviously, that's an issue you will always have, but I felt we had that way too much last year.

Do you think you've found a better balance this year? What would you say the divide is because you said it was you and dupreeh, Magisk, and ZywOo all talking, what's the balance now?

I think that obviously and dupreeh and Magisk have just lowered the way the talk a bit when I speak. I mean, if I am not speaking that's an issue and ZywOo has the same intensity and also they've learned a lot this year, making more team decisions himself and it's easier for the whole team to play as well. I think what's important at the beginning of the team is who has the big voices because we have five players, imagine all of them talking all the time.

I think what's important in FaZe, is that I don't think rain speaks that much, broky speaks a bit but not too much. It's more the others and you cannot have four guys talking all the time. Sometimes I feel like it was a disaster because I couldn't even speak myself because it would have been too much. Now with more balance, we are talking a bit less overall.

You mentioned ZywOo talking a lot more and taking more initiative. I remember I read previous interviews where you were talking about him needing to do that. What that something that came from him, where he finally took that initiative himself or did it come from a constant push?

Even with XTQZZZ in years before it was the case that we tried to. First of all, ZywOo is a shy guy when we first met him so we needed to build his confidence to be able to do that. I think after repeating all the time to him that he needs to speak more, to do more moves, and blah blah blah, now he takes over in a lot of things he also helps me with the calls. I told him, "You have such a good feeling individually, I also want to feel that as a team," and sometimes he has a call. I need ZywOo, everyone will listen to him and we trust him, and when he has a call, most of the time I say, "Let's go!" And it's really good for the team.

He needs this place above the team because he's a star and that's how it is. He needs to be what we call a "technical captain" in football. He is one, and he needs to be like that. He has improved so much and that's really good for the team.

One of the names you didn't mention having a voice is Spinx, but he has obviously found his footing too — something he was struggling with before. Can you just walk me through his development? Because we used to talk about him playing connector and you need him to play that initiative there, right?

I think what happened with Spinx is that he had too much respect for the players we have, and that was really tough for him to take over. For example, on Overpass he was playing with ZywOo on A. On HLTV, stats-wise, the best CT player on Overpass is the rifle on A and not the AWP. We told him "stop respecting who you are playing and play your fucking game mate. We need you." And now look at our last five Overpass, he 20-bombs every game. He understood what he had to do.

He is also very good at mid-calling and helping me with calls, and I think ZywOo and Lotan almost are the perfect teammates you could ever have. In the way they act and not raging too much and being passive when they have to. They are like diamonds to play with and obviously, Spinx has developed so much since the beginning of the year.

The playstyle ENCE had back then was way easier for him to take space and everyone was taking space and running everywhere so he had a lot of gaps to lurk. It was way easier for him. With our way to play was a bit tough, but now I feel like he understands that he has to play for himself, not for the team, of course, he has to 5-10% of the time. This more baity role or star role because we needed this passive player because we have very aggressive players. He showed it in Rio and he was insane and I think he found his groove in some ways.

Something Spinx mentioned in Rio was being able to play these officials in Rio rather than just practice leading into the Major. Obviously, it has been two weeks where you haven't played officials and you do have teams who are warmed up from the Challengers Stage, so how are you feeling going into this?

I think we built some confidence at the RMR and Rio. I am fine to not play the tournament and I am really happy to not have to play this Challengers Stage because what happened for us in Rio is that we went 3-2 and it took a lot of energy. Imagine, the 3-2 team finished yesterday. Today they have media day which is four or five hours here, and you have no time to rest. I remember in Rio being really tough so it's all about having this extra time.

Obviously the other teams have already played like G2, the team we are going to face and it's fine. It's all about us, we know how to enter into the game and that's what is going to matter most tomorrow in best-of-ones.

Let's talk about the team you are going to play, G2. You beat them at the RMR, so can you talk to me about that match-up? It's a top-five team you have to face in the opening round, not ideal I am sure, but tell me about that.

Overall I am fine to face any team. I don't think it's about facing a lower team that's going to help us. If you want to go far in big tournaments, you need to face any team and be able to beat them. So we faced G2 at the RMR and we played quite well, especially on Anubis and we did a good comeback on Mirage. I think we didn't expect them to play Mirage and we expected them to pick Inferno against us, but they picked MIrage.

Obviously, this map is a bit left and right sometimes for us, but we had a good comeback. We also did not expect Anubis and we beat them in quite an easy way I would say, but tomorrow it's going to be a bit different. Tomorrow it's going to be a best-of-one, big fight with pistol rounds and anti-ecos will change the game.

We have a lot of respect for them, for the team, and for both the players as humans because we are really close to each other. Tomorrow we are not friends, we are against each other. I expect a good game and I hope we both qualify for playoffs.

Finally talking about the playoffs. A lot of emphasis on Paris for you so playing in front of that crowd. Tell me about wanting to make it and actually get in front of that crowd.

It's the first goal of the team to play there. Being able to play on our home soil and in front of French people. I guarantee you it's going to be a crazy Major, I have no doubts about that, I need to be a part of that and I need my team to be a part of that. I am just so excited and so focused on being able to reach that goal because I know it means to all the French and everyone to be able to see us in the arena. I think it could be one of the most magic moments in our lives, so let's make it.