mezii: "We know when we're the No.1 team, a lot of teams are looking at us to try to beat us and end our streak"

"We want to get this third trophy and top off the long month away from home," the British player said.

Vitality clinched a spot in the BLAST Open Lisbon final following a 2-1 victory over Spirit, extending their win streak to 15 series. It was far from an easy match for Dan "⁠apEX⁠" Madesclaire's troops, who stole Spirit's map pick but were then outclassed on their own pick.

The series came down to Mirage, where Vitality ran out 13-10 winners thanks to a 1.70-rated performance from Mathieu "⁠ZywOo⁠" Herbaut. who racked up 18 kills with the AWP.

"I think that when you have an impactful AWPer like this, especially the No.1 player in the world, it's really tough for any team to be able to go up against that," William "⁠mezii⁠" Merriman told HLTV after the match.

Vitality will take on MOUZ on Sunday in a best-of-five final, aiming for their third trophy in a row. Though his team has a 7-0 record against Ludvig "⁠Brollan⁠" Brolin's side in 2025, mezii believes this matchup is only getting tougher.

Date	Matches
BLAST Open Lisbon 2025
30/03/2025	MOUZ 17:30 Vitality	Match

"It was close last time, and they're definitely going to want to win this time," he said. "But for us, we want to get this third trophy and top off the long month away from home."

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A 2-1 victory in a close match, especially towards the end. Can you give me your thoughts on the series?

When we're up against Spirit, we always know it is going to be a close game, especially when they want revenge after Katowice. We knew it was going to be a tough game. We know when we're the No.1 team, a lot of teams are looking at us to try and beat us and end our streak. I'm just happy we stepped up on the third map. I think we didn't play our best on the second map, but they played a really good Nuke. So it was tough, but overall, I'm just happy we were able to close it out.

It was a quiet performance from your team on Nuke. apEX was just saying he felt the team was sleeping in that game. What do you think happened?

I think in some of the rounds, we probably had some chances to win. We definitely didn't do the smaller details in terms of communication and playing off of each other. I think there were a couple of times when we got a bit caught off guard in certain positions. But overall, I think it was also tough. I think they played a really good CT side. I think in a couple of rounds they were stacked where we were going, like we would go outside and there would be three ready for us. So I think overall, they did play a strong game, but we could have done better as individuals to communicate a bit more and do the final details.

What did you discuss after Nuke to ensure Mirage would be a different story?

 I think it's something that we've always been prepared for. Of course, we're on a good streak, and we've been dominating a lot of games. But I think we are all prepared, we know we could go a map down, we could lose a map, it could go 1-1, but we know as a team we need to stay mentally stronger. We need to say, 'Okay, we don't care about this map. They played well, but now we need to step up. We need to play better as a team.'

And that's all our focus. We really didn't care about what happened on Nuke. We just needed to focus on Mirage and play our game  because we know that if we do our teamwork properly and play well as individuals, I don't think many teams stand a chance. And I think today, we showed it a bit better on Mirage, at least.

Mirage was starting to get away from you, but then you had that amazing 2K with the Deagle and then a kill with the AWP. It must have felt amazing to get a round like that when the team needed some kind of a push, right?

I'm always trying to find some impact. I think it was tough on Nuke to try and find it. It felt like it was a rough game overall for us. But on Mirage it's always nice to be able to find that impact and come up with a round to kind of push us forward. And also getting a kill with the AWP, I think it's a bit of a meme in our team. I don't get to pick up the AWP so much. It was nice to pick it up and get a kill with it. So, yeah, it just feels nice to be able to find impact. That's all I'm trying to do in the team, trying to find this and help us win rounds.

And when the team needed him the most, ZywOo stepped up to the plate with the AWP and got a lot of multi-kills. How do you look at his performance on Mirage?

It's so nice when he takes over like this. Obviously, he's an incredible rifler, but he's an AWPer at first, and I think he did a really great job today to be able to find those picks, multi-kills across the maps, and especially on Mirage, he was clutching as well. And I think that when you have an impactful AWPer like this, especially the No.1 player in the world, it's really tough for any team to be able to go up against that.

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torzsi: "This could be my year, but I hope this will be the MOUZ year"

You're now going up against MOUZ in the final. I spoke with torzsi today, and he said that he wants to take revenge on your team. You've faced them three times this year. They didn't manage to take a single map off of you in those series, but the last game you played, in the group stage in Copenhagen, was very close. What expectations do you have for tomorrow?

Like I said before, I think every team is going to want to get revenge against us, especially MOUZ. We've had a lot of maps against them, and I think in some way, it's obviously going to become tougher for us because of the preparation, and they know exactly how we like to play. So there are a lot of mind games there. But we're just focused on making sure we can play our best because, like I said, going up against MOUZ, it was close last time, and they're definitely going to want to win this time. But for us, we want to get this third trophy and top off the long month away from home.

I hope we can do it because we definitely feel comfortable against MOUZ, but we know they're going to come even more fired up, and they'll want the revenge as well. So we'll see. But we're confident.

 It's been a long month for you guys, straight from Stockholm to Copenhagen and now Lisbon. You'll have some time off after this one. Just one final push, right?

 Yeah, that's what we keep saying to each other. We had a bit of downtime between the group stage and the playoff stage. So for us, we know it's one more game. One more day to spend here and away from home. We now just need to do the final push, put in all the work we can for this. We know we will get time off afterward for a little bit. Our main focus is to just keep working hard and let's close it out on a high.