NAF: "We need to find our own identity and not be Heroic or FaZe"

The Canadian rifler says meshing several different styles into one will take a lot of time.

Liquid had a turbulent 2023, with their transition to a European roster during the summer not delivering the results required. Keith "⁠NAF⁠" Markovic and Mareks "⁠YEKINDAR⁠" Gaļinskis were the only survivors from that project and were joined by Felipe "⁠skullz⁠" Medeiros, Russel "⁠Twistzz⁠" Van Dulken, and Casper "⁠cadiaN⁠" Møller. That led to a mesh of different styles of play, with the team's coach, Wilton "⁠zews⁠" Prado, saying the process would no doubt take time.

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zews interview: NAF & Twistzz's growth, shaping Liquid's new foundation, skullz's process

Their start to the season was far from smooth, with troubles in North American online qualifiers starting them off. Their LAN debut was a victory, but the match against a depleted Spirit was far from convincing.

After their win against Dmitry "⁠sh1ro⁠" Sokolov and company, NAF sat down with HLTV for a chat about his role, the team's expectations, and his reunion with Twistzz and zews.

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First of all, congrats on the victory, but it probably didn't go the way you expected.

Yeah, definitely not. Spirit have a bit of an asterisk around their name with donk and magixx not being here. Coming into the game, we felt more confident. Overall, Spirit played pretty well with what they had, they cooked up some good game plans.

It's safe to say if they had magixx and donk, we probably would have lost that one. But props to Spirit, they played pretty well, especially with having a coach and a stand-in. We have a lot to improve on, and we just need to do better if we want to win against teams that have a full five-man lineup.

At the end of the day, it's still a win in your first LAN appearance with this roster. Does it feel good in a way?

It feels good to start with a win. We've only been a team for a little bit and I feel like nowadays it takes time to get better, improve as a team, and show what we're really capable of. I think back in the day, you could probably mix and match, pick up players, jump right into it, and still win events. Back in the day, CS was a lot different, now you need a lot of time to become a championship contender. We have things to work on, so we just have to keep moving forward.

To ask you about your new team, cadiaN spoke about you two having a very good relationship even before you became teammates. How has it been now that you're in a team together?

Casper [cadiaN] is really good, I like his personality. He's outgoing, and his leadership and calling are really good. It takes a lot of time for us to improve ourselves as players and teammates, for people to understand each other, and just know the things that we want to do and what we like to do.

But overall, playing with Casper is great. I've always talked to him before when he was on Heroic, and I could tell he has a good spirit and good energy, especially for being a captain in the game. So I'm super happy with what we have. We just need to keep working, keep improving, show up, and do better things.

You said it takes time to mesh all these different styles together, but how is it going so far?

A lot of it is definitely between Twistzz, Casper, and Mareks [YEKINDAR]. Mareks is really strong and confident in his way of playing because Virtus.pro, his previous team, had a specific way of playing and thinking about the game.

Then you have cadiaN, he was on Heroic, and throughout his time there, they were always pretty much fighting for number one on HLTV. He's confident in his game plans and the way he runs things. And then you have Twistzz, who won a lot with FaZe, so he believes in a lot of the things karrigan was calling and doing, and all of their ideas.

Right now it still just takes a lot of time for us to mix and match and figure out what's best for us and Liquid. There are a bunch of different ways of playing. We just have to find ways that we can solidify and agree to play together, and that's what we're going to hopefully do.

I also wanted to ask about the Twistzz reunion. You've played together quite a long time ago, but is there still a dynamic between you two there?

It's been a long time, but overall, I think he's grown up a lot. He's improved a lot and played with FaZe, all the championships that he achieved over the years, and getting that European experience. Playing with players like karrigan and rain, veterans of the game, he's grown and matured a lot. Even myself, I've definitely changed my ways growing up.

But overall, he's still somewhat of the same kid that I knew, he's just a little bit older now. It's nice to play with him, especially with another Canadian on the team. I feel we're the carriers of North America, I mean you still have EliGE there (laughs). I'm excited to keep working and moving forward with him and the team.

HLTV did an interview with zews where he was super positive about your development, not only as a player but as a person as well. So do you feel like you came into this team as a more complete player and person?

As I've gotten older and just grown, I think it's just natural in life that you think about things differently. Also, the way that my roles have shifted, I became more of an anchor. I've always been somewhat of a passive player, a little bit quieter sitting on the side. I'm picking up the slack in the roles that maybe some people don't want to do, and sometimes it can be tricky. You need to wait, play really passively, and think about a lot of things, and some players might fall asleep while doing that.

In my roles, you need to have a lot of experience to excel at it. I've learned a lot playing with previous players and teams. I played with a lot of players on Liquid so far, so I've definitely learned and thought about things differently going through all the rosters and hardships with my previous teams. Now I'm just doing what my team needs me to do, giving my best, and hopefully, we can all perform. It's been a while for Liquid, so hopefully we can all bring that back with this lineup.

Going back in time a bit, you were in NA playing qualifiers, but it didn't exactly kind of go to plan. RMR went well, but the IEM China qualifier didn't. Were you surprised by the level of some of the teams?

I have to give props to M80 in those games that they played, they're playing really well. It's nice to see an NA team, even though they do have a Danish IGL and a German AWPer. It is nice to have some players step up. I know Swisher has been around the scene, he's always been a pretty hot prospect, and they have a few other guys on the team that I think are pretty good. Overall, it's somewhat surprising, but at the same time, it isn't. We haven't been a team that long, and we're still figuring things out. We do have big names on the team with Twistzz and cadiaN so a lot of people are expecting a lot more, but like we all mentioned in previous interviews we're still learning how to play with each other.

Twistzz and cadiaN have their own systems from their previous teams or the cultures that they grew up playing in. We're still all trying to learn and figure out what's the best formula for us on Liquid, to not try to be Heroic or FaZe. We need to find our own identity and our own way of playing the game, which takes time. I know maybe the fans are pretty disappointed so far with the results, but I do believe with time we'll get better, I believe in the squad that we have, and we're confident.

When you've been to NA, how was practice there? Did it make the process of improving harder?

Practicing in regions like North America, Asia, or South America, it's usually always going to be rough because that's not where the tier-one Counter-Strike is. A lot of us really know the way of playing the game in Europe. But when you go to North America or these other regions, the gameplay and the game style are different, and it catches you off guard because it's not what you expect. You're so used to playing against European opponents and the tier-one playstyle.

With the practice and all that, I believe there were some teams there. Again, we do have M80, NRG just reentered the scene with some of the players they brought in. Hopefully, there can be a bit of a resurgence and growth, especially with the new plans going out in 2025 about not doing too many partner leagues. Maybe that'll benefit NA CS and just smaller scenes in general. I've seen an improvement, but it definitely needs some more time.

After BLAST, you don't have an invite to Katowice. Is the plan to practice in Europe or go back home?

We're going to go back home for a couple of days. Some people have some things to do, but we're going to come straight back to practice. It's a huge bummer to not be playing at Katowice, it's one of the biggest events in Counter-Strike. We're just going to go home for a little bit, come back, practice, and put in a three-week bootcamp in Europe to get ready for the RMR. That's obviously a very important event.

It'll be interesting playing against NA teams, different styles, maybe a style that we're not going to be too used to playing against. We just need to make sure we're in good shape, focus on ourselves with our strategies and our aim, and just work on ourselves. And if we all excel at what we're doing there, I'm sure we can still pop off and qualify for the Major, that's the main goal.