huNter: "It's not sure that m0NESY will come yet"

huNter- elaborated on the risk of being forced to use a stand-in for the second time in a row.

When news emerged that G2 intended to use American rifler Jake "⁠Stewie2K⁠" Yip in place of an absent Rasmus "⁠HooXi⁠" Nielsen for IEM Dallas, many readily dismissed the chances of the European side even reaching the stage of the Texas event.

Instead, G2 pieced together an impressive run through the group stage that only compounded once in front of the American crowd, Ilya "⁠m0NESY⁠" Osipov and Nikola "⁠NiKo⁠" Kovač powered G2 to their first trophy of 2024 in the most unlikely circumstances imaginable.

G2 should be heading to the BLAST Premier Spring Finals hoping to carry the momentum from their Dallas victory, but the news that m0NESY may be unable to reach London as a result of visa issues has marred the team's final event of the season. The AWPer has since gotten his visa granted, but his arrival in time for G2's first match is still up in the air.

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m0NESY set to travel to BLAST Premier Spring Final after last-minute visa approval

Ahead of G2's opening match versus Spirit, Nemanja "⁠huNter-⁠" Kovač spoke with HLTV regarding m0NESY's potential absence from the event, the team's takeaways from their stellar IEM Dallas run, and the criticism that teammates HooXi and Nemanja "⁠nexa⁠" Isaković have faced.

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How are the team feeling now that you've had a little bit of time to reflect on Dallas? I imagine it was a bit of a whirlwind, but now that you're about a week past it, what's the mood like?

We feel really good. The feelings are kinda different because we played with a stand-in and we played without our IGL, and we didn't have that much time to rest and think about it because we still don't believe what we did there. It's just a crazy story overall. But we feel really good, especially because it's almost at the end of the season that we managed to win that event and go into vacation knowing that we won one event at least. It feels good.

How does it affect your team moving forwards? Do you feel it was a one-off or can you carry some confidence from this result?

I'm pretty sure that we carry some confidence overall because HooXi didn't give up on us completely. He was there, he was all the time during practice with us, trying to help us, even sending us what we did wrong and what we could do better. He was a big part of our win as well. He helped us especially after we lost to Vitality on the first day. When they smashed us he called us the next day and told us what we did wrong and what we could do better.

He didn't give up on us like 90% of people would do or I would do if I could not go (chuckles), so, yeah, he's a big part of it. Of course, the pressure is always around and especially when you're not there with a team winning the trophy, but he's of course a part of the team and he was always, and that's all our success.

Does it make a little easier for him, do you think, because he can share in the success a little bit more?

Yeah, I think it makes life easier for him. He was asking us after the event, the first thing when we came back to practice before this event, he asked us, 'How did you guys win? I wanna know what you did to win that event.' Because it was crazy. Of course we had some luck, especially during the group stage, but overall it's a crazy story.

What lessons are you taking forward from Dallas that think can help the team?

I think individually we stepped up a lot in a lot of aspects. I think we all gave our best and we didn't lean on anyone or trust on one guy to do everything. We all helped, our energy and mood was very good during the whole event and especially during playoffs. It doesn't matter the results because we came back a lot of times during the event and we didn't care much about the result overall. There was less pressure, and I think that's what we need to have as well even when we play with the full lineup.

That's what we learned, and to not ever give up and not try to always lean on one guy and to trust he will do everything by himself. Of course, m0NESY is doing a great job and he's amazing this year, and without him it wouldn't be possible, but I think we all stepped up in a lot of aspects that people cannot see from the other side. I'm very happy because of that.

Talking about people from the outside looking in, HooXi and nexa are two players who get a fair bit of crticism from the community. After this Dallas win, what are your reflections on HooXi and nexa? nexa maybe didn't have the best individual showing, you won a tournament without HooXi, does it change your opinion on the players after winning Dallas?

No, of course not. We went there without any pressure, we just tried to enjoy and have fun with each other and with Stewie, who is an amazing guy as well. It doesn't change anything, everybody gave their best that we could do. Of course, some of us didn't have the best event, nexa didn't, I was very bad during group stage and stepped up in the playoffs in some games at some point, but that doesn't change anything.

The most important at the end is, if you win, everyone is winning the event. Everybody had some good rounds or something that people cannot see from the outside, as I already said. nexa is always good to do anything that we want for the team. He's not selfish and whatever you tell him to do he will do without asking a question. That's really important, to have that kind of a guy in the team who was an IGL before and who can help in a lot of aspects.

I'm very happy because of him, especially because it was the first tier-one event win for him and in G2 as well together, so I'm very happy that we did it.

Looking at this event, what are the expectations? Is the goal to come here and win it?

I mean, without m0NESY... We don't know, still. He still has visa issues. The visa is on the way, but we're not sure if it will come on time because he needs to travel to Amsterdam and the visa will come there. It's not sure that he will come yet, but even if he comes he will come like one or two hours before the game, so we're focused on that mainly.

It's very tough to play without him especially, without any player, but without Ilya it's just tough. We didn't even have that much time to practice, so expectations... I don't know what to expect because I don't know if he will play or not. If he comes, of course we'll try our best to win every game we can. If not, we'll try to have fun, we'll try to enjoy and try to win.

We went to Dallas with the mindset to have fun and try to enjoy, but once you sit and once you play, you wanna win against everyone, it doesn't matter the circumstances. We'll try our best to win every game, with Ilya or without Ilya, and we'll see how it goes.