SZPERO on Rebels run: "We wanted to prove we are capable of playing a good game on LAN"

Rebels' coach spoke about the team's impressive play at IEM Katowice and adapting to a new role fresh off his retirement as a player.

Ranked 118th before they sat down to play in their home country's iconic event, IEM Katowice, Rebels were complete outsiders in the Play-in, but they surprised many by making it through the first stage and looking competitive in the group stage against some of the world's best.

They got off to a hot start with a best-of-one win over Cloud9 and later beat M80 in a series to qualify for groups, where they then went on to take Falcons to their limit in an elimination series.

Following their exit from the tournament, HLTV spoke to a proud Grzegorz "⁠SZPERO⁠" Dziamałek about the surprising run. The coach, who only just joined the team three weeks ahead of the tournament following his retirement as a player, talked about his new job and Rebels goals in the near future.

Tell me about your experience at IEM Katowice. You beat some big names along the way in Cloud9 and had a big chance even in the Falcons game — how did it go?

To be honest, we had no expectations to be here. We just wanted to play our best game and just prove especially to the Polish viewers that we are capable of playing a good game on LAN because there were some suspicions online. That was our main goal. We had some really bad results before the tournament online, we just lost almost everything, so our mood was pretty bad.

When we got here we started the first game against Cloud9 and we just felt like we can do a lot. I don't know why, my players felt like the opposition is not as amazing as we thought, and that we can fight. We were pretty well-prepared strat-wise, I think. We also had a good analysis, so when we won the first game, it was like, 'okay, we can do it.' And we just went ahead and tried to play the best games.

Do you feel like you did prove what you were talking about, that you can compete at this level?

Yes, of course, because we beat like the 8th team on HLTV. Cloud9 is an amazing team, with amazing players, Major winners. So yeah, we proved it. We went through the Play-ins, we were in the top 16 in Katowice, so it's amazing.

This game against Falcons you had quite a good chance to go through to the next round. How are you feeling about this match in particular?

Yeah, I'm a little bit sad right now because I felt like we could do it, that we could win against Falcons, also a team with amazing players: the trio of ENCE and Magisk, a four-time Major winner. We were a little bit sad after the game, but overall I feel like we should be happy because of that, because we fought with very good teams. Yesterday we played against FaZe and I think we also did very well, we made great comebacks. So yeah, we are pretty happy.

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I can also add that for Kisserek and Flayy it was the first big LAN and they played so well. Flayy had an amazing game now, for Kisserek it was the first game against Cloud9. I'm very proud of them. They have no experience, so I think further tournaments should be even better.

You only came in a couple of weeks ago. How did this even happen, how did you come to join this team? Were you already familiar with them up to that point?

My journey as a coach started like three weeks ago. They joined Rebels and were looking for a coach, and first the organization wrote to me if maybe I want to be a coach. I wanted to get to know them, so I started to play FACEIT and I felt like they were really good players, that they have so much potential, they are smart. It just started like that, and I decided to join the team. I just went to the bootcamp. It was my first bootcamp as a coach, but I have Cr0n0s as a performance coach, who's really helping me with my role.

Since the first day I really liked this job. I'm still learning, of course, but my players are telling me that I'm doing a really good job, so I'm very happy about this. I hope I will gather experience and it will be better.

Was coaching something you were thinking about as your next step in your career?

Yes, I was thinking about coaching, but I didn't expect it would be so fast. I wanted to first officially announce my retirement as a player, and then I wanted to chill for a few months to have some fun in life. For the first time, this team is good for gathering experience because it's a very good organization. Rebels are very nice, they have everything to be a good team, and also it's helping me because I need to speak in English.

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How do you translate this result into the future? What's the goal for this year to achieve with this team?

Of course we want to stick together, we want to play as many tournaments as we can to get experience. Before this LAN we had pretty bad results, but right now we are more confident and we want to play good online. We have ESL Challenger, we want to try to qualify for ESL Pro League, and we will see.

I hope we can get some invites, maybe not tier-one events but tier-two, tier-three, because, as I said, we just need to play more and develop our team. We are only playing for like three weeks because the Paloma roster had changes before joining Rebels, so I think we need more time, and I hope after this IEM we will be fighting with top teams in the future.