Aleksib: "I don't think we are where we want to be yet, but this victory is super important for us"

The Finnish captain believes that playing in front of a crowd in Lisbon can unlock a new level to the team's game.

Natus Vincere joined Vitality, MOUZ and Eternal Fire in locking up a spot in the playoff stages of BLAST Open Lisbon following a hard-fought 2-1 win over The MongolZ, exacting revenge on the Asian giants for the 0-2 loss in ESL Pro League a week earlier.

Things looked bleak for NAVI at one point, as they were hammered 13-1 on Inferno after winning the first map, Dust2, in convincing fashion. On the third map, Aleksi "⁠Aleksib⁠" Virolainen's troops overcame a 0-5 start and recovered from a lost anti-force to seal victory in overtime.

"Getting blown out like that on Inferno and then how we managed to treat each other and treat the game on the decider, I think that speaks volumes in our camp," he told HLTV after the match.

Aleksib also played down a disagreement between Mihai "⁠iM⁠" Ivan and Valeriy "⁠b1t⁠" Vakhovskiy after Dust2, which he chalked up to the tension of the moment. "As soon as we went out outside, they just talked it out and, you know, shook hands and were smiling again."

Three months into 2025, Natus Vincere are still chasing their first trophy of the year. Aleksib acknowledged that there are teams out there that "look super strong" at the moment, but he believes the crowd factor can play in NAVI's favor. "I feel that can be a factor that will boost us to the next level to beat some of these teams that look super sharp right now."

If you can't see the embed above, you can listen to the audio recording of this interview on Spotify.

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A 2-1 victory and you're through to the playoffs. A weird series, with two one-sided maps followed by an overtime game here on Mirage. Can you walk me through the match?

We started with our pick, Dust2. We did, I feel like, a good preparation. Played a decent T side, but we already saw that we had a lot of moments when we were nervous. Even though we got ten rounds on the T side, we felt like we weren't in this flow that we usually are in when we have ten rounds. And I think when we closed it out, when we went to Inferno, the T side, they just blew us out. And I don't think we had played such a weak map before, as a team. Maybe the Major final against FaZe on Mirage was the same.

And basically, what ended up happening was that at 0-5 or 0-6 we realized we were not even playing the game. Like, we're forcing the strats, we're dying in the first ten seconds. Nothing is working, we're not constantly trying to improve it. We're, like, digging a deeper hole for ourselves.

And I feel that the only reason we came back was the fact we understood this wasn't us and we could play much better. And the flow, the mood and the communication we had going into the third map were completely opposite, even compared to Dust2, which we had won. And, you know, we ended up behind, but we clawed our way back into the game. We ended up losing the force buy on the T side, which made the comeback even harder. But, you know, we managed to take it to OT and once we did it, I just knew that we were going to close the game out.

In a pre-match interview, bLitz said he was a little bit surprised by your veto. He didn't expect you to ban Ancient, and he felt that you were scared of them on that map. It was a little bit of a sign of respect on your part to ban Ancient like that, don't you think?

Maybe. But also, we've done a lot of work these past two months, and we also want to feel our map pool. And I really like Inferno, we did a lot of work on this map, and we will continue to do so. So I don't really mind it. And, to be honest, I liked the fact that the veto was a bit different. I'm not sure if they were expecting us to pick Dust2 or whatever there, but at the end of the day, sometimes games go like this. And what matters in the end is that we walked away with the victory and they didn't.

I wanted to ask you about something that happened at the end of Dust2. At the end of the game, b1t walked past iM, he shook your hand, but he didn't reach out his hand for iM. It felt like b1t wasn't happy with the way iM had died in the final round. Can you tell me what happened? Did you notice anything?

Yeah. Basically, they both had an idea of how to play the situation. It was very hectic on TeamSpeak, you can imagine, because it's crunch time and everybody's saying what they're doing. And basically, they didn't connect in that situation. And even though we ended up winning the round, it felt like there was a bit of tension because obviously the pressure is high, but as soon as we went out outside, they just talked it out and, you know, shook hands and were smiling again.

So it's just like… when you have this high-pressure moment, sometimes you might say things in a heated way or it might feel like things are not good, but, you know, five seconds later I was just smiling, so…

Before your first match here, you said that you wanted to see NAVI with the flow and the vibe of a functioning team. Do you think we saw signs of that today?

I mean, for sure, in terms of mentality. As I told you, getting blown out like that on Inferno and then how we managed to treat each other and treat the game on the decider, I think that speaks volumes in our camp. So I'm super happy about that. I'm going to be honest: I don't think we are where we want to be yet this year, but this victory is super important for us, considering we had just lost to them in the playoffs of EPL.  So we're going to take everything we have. We've secured our spot in Lisbon, and now we're going to work twice as hard for that.

Heading into this tournament, there was all this talk about NAVI maybe being in crisis after that loss to The MongolZ. Do you think people were overreacting to what happened in just one tournament?

Crisis is… [laughs] a strong word to use. The amount of time I've been a pro, when you have a team that has been together for as long as we have, you always see the moment when they peak and the moment when they go down a bit. And I feel like it's only natural, and we are working. We have a lot of good staff members behind the scenes who are trying to build us up and motivate us.

The thing is, everything we do feels so normal. We've done these things a thousand times. We just need to find the excitement, the supportive element to each other, playing for the team rather than stats or anything like that. Everything comes together if we want to play as we did last season. So I feel it's only natural, and we're doing our best.

Date	Matches
BLAST Open Lisbon 2025
24/03/2025	Eternal Fire 16:35 Natus Vincere	Match

You still have to play one more match here for a semi-final spot, but considering how you've been playing here, how far do you think you can go in the playoffs?

I do think that there are teams now that look super strong, if you compare us on paper right now, form-wise.  But what I do know is that if we get to play in front of a crowd, anything can happen. That's one of the key details we did last season that now... For example, EPL playoffs didn't have any audience. We had an audience in Katowice, we ended up losing to Spirit, but, at the end of the day, that was the first match in front of a crowd.

It's going to be super nice to play in front of a crowd. And I feel that can be a factor that will boost us to the next level to beat some of these teams that look super sharp right now. But I do think, other than that, the other teams that are going to qualify, you know, I'll take our chances. I feel like we're a strong team and we can reach the semis easily if we play our A-game. And from there we just need to get that 5 per cent to be in the grand finals and challenge for the trophy.