fear: "b1t gave me some sleeping pills, I slept well, and we qualified for the Major"

The Ukrainian IGL attributes his good performance to the help of his countryman.

Passion UA are an incredibly young team with an average age of 19.8 that played just one LAN tournament before coming to the RMR — the RTV Euro AGD Game Zone Masters 2024, where they placed 3-4th after a loss to Permitta.

The team looked a completely different side in Shanghai, however, and won their best-of-one games against Virtus.pro and Spirit to finish day one with a 2-0 record.

Date	Matches
Perfect World Shanghai Major 2024 Europe RMR B
21/11/2024	Virtus.pro Finished 14:16 Passion UA	Match
21/11/2024	Spirit Finished 11:13 Passion UA	Match
22/11/2024	Passion UA Finished 1:2 BIG	Match
23/11/2024	Passion UA Finished 1:2 HEROIC	Match
24/11/2024	Astralis Finished 0:2 Passion UA	Match

Losses to BIG and HEROIC almost brought the fairytale to an end, but the Ukrainian squad rallied to beat Astralis and make history as the first full Ukrainian team at a Major.

After the win against the Danes, Rodion "⁠fear⁠" Smyk spoke to HLTV about their campaign in Shanghai, Valeriy "⁠b1t⁠" Vakhovskiy's help with sleeping issues, and his expectations for the Major.

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Congratulations again, you have qualified for the Major. How do you feel right now?

Thank you. I feel really good. I am proud of my team and my family. Everyone is happy, we have been working for this for eight months, as I said in the previous interview.

You are the first full Ukrainian roster to make it to the Major. How proud does that make you feel?

We are so proud, that was our goal. We understand that if we qualified, we would be the first Ukrainian lineup to do it, so we made history. It's really nice.

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You went 2-0, but then you lost to BIG and HEROIC. Did you feel any pressure in those games? Because you won the first map in both matches and didn't get the win in the end.

Overall, I could see that many players struggled in this tournament, maybe it's because of jet lag. I played maybe my worst tournament, only the last match versus Astralis was good. I slept badly before my friend b1t helped me a lot last night. He gave me some pills, I slept well, and we qualified for the Major.

Maybe if I had done it before BIG or HEROIC, we would have qualified faster. But [we didn't feel] any pressure. We understood the pressure was on their side, we just tried to do our best, that's it. We also understood we could do it.

How did you turn around your performance in this game? Because this time it was you who won the 2v4 and 2v5 clutch situations.

On Ancient, I took control of micromanagement. I said, "jackasmo, jack, spam noob corner.' You know what, you need to put this on HLTV. Someone said we would not play on the last update, we would play on some older version, and after the first match versus HEROIC, I stood in the noob corner and the guy spammed me, so I was like 'Guys, what the fuck, this isn't the old patch, it's new patch'.

I realized maybe people have the same vision as me, so I told jackasmo, "You're low hp, spam," and then I said, "jambo, double flash long," so one guy would be blind, the second guy would try to cover him, and jackasmo needed to smoke. First of all, he said, "I will walk through the smoke", and then I upgraded and said, "jambo, double flash, and then walk". Good game for me, thanks to b1t for giving me this pill.

You are a very young team, but you have a very experienced coach. Did he help you come through in some tough situations and high-pressure moments?

In this victory, everyone had a very big impact. Coach, players, if Kane wasn't there, we would not have qualified. He had a very nice impact, he helped me and the players, and he gave us a calm vision. Kane is a true legend, a Major winner.

You are representing Passion UA, which is an organization owned by Zinchenko. How involved is he in the whole process?

We talk with him, he always sends us some voice messages. We are in touch with him.

Did he give you any encouragement before this game?

Of course, he is our best football player right now. He is professional and he gives us many tips. Psychology, how to prepare ourselves before important matches. He helps us a lot.

You have made the Major. You have proved you can beat a very good team in a best-of-three, Astralis. The pressure is now off in a way; what's next for Passion UA at the Major?

If fear steps up and plays like [he did] against Astralis, be ready, baby. We will do damage.