dexter: "I'd love to be able to have the opportunity to play in Europe again"

"I've talked to some people about it, and it's definitely a possibility," the former FlyQuest captain said.

As the IEM Melbourne field whittled down to its last six teams after a group stage played behind closed doors, thousands of fans filled the stands of the Rod Laver Arena in each of the three days of the playoffs. It was a celebration of the return of tier-one Counter-Strike to Oceania (there was no IEM Sydney in 2024), but there were two notable absentees.

The first was Justin "⁠jks⁠" Savage, the most popular player in the region and the first to earn a place in HLTV's Top 20 Player of the Year ranking. The other one? Christopher "⁠dexter⁠" Nong, a veteran IGL who has led not only some of the best Australian rosters in recent years but also two historical European teams in ​​MOUZ and fnatic.

dexter even lives in the area, but he decided against going to the event as a fan. Doing so would have been a constant reminder that he was supposed to be playing in the tournament before he was benched and eventually released by FlyQuest.

"I think as soon as it hit me, it definitely hurt," dexter told HLTV in a remote interview earlier this month.

The team opted to bring in Corey "⁠nettik⁠" Browne, one of Oceania's most promising players, and give the captaincy back to Joshua "⁠INS⁠" Potter, who had held that role before dexter returned to the roster in December 2023. As shocking as it was, the move paid instant dividends as the team played some of its best Counter-Strike in months in Melbourne, beating Virtus.pro and taking a map off Natus Vincere.

When Declan "⁠Vexite⁠" Portelli's comments about the team having different visions on how to play to game were put to him, dexter acknowledged that "there were a lot of directions that each player wanted to take."

"It just came as a surprise with many new ways of people seeing CS and whatever," he said. "And it's good that everyone's growing in their own way. But as soon as that kind of happens, it’s just going to create a lot of drama with how we want to play together."

Since his benching, dexter has been doing his best to keep up with the meta and is watching as many events as possible. He has also been playing "little bits here and there," but his focus has been on enjoying himself as much as possible after several years on the grind with almost no downtime.

"I think I'm getting the heavy lifts and now I'm becoming a full gym bro," he said. "And I'm happy, and that's where I want to continue with myself as a person and in CS as well."

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dexter enters free agency

He is looking forward to the next chapter of his career, and there are several avenues that he will explore after the Major. He is open to the idea of building an Australian team from scratch that can compete for the No.2 status in the country, but his priority is competing abroad. He is setting his sights on a new European spell and has already had exploratory talks to make it happen.

"I would love to be able to have the opportunity to play in Europe again," he said. "I've talked to some people about it, and it's definitely a possibility.

"I would love to kind of just really just re-immerse myself in European CS as much as possible. I'll be fine with NA if you're able to go over to Europe a lot more, but the main thing would be I would love to kind of play or lead a European team, just like a multicultural team.

"I have so much more to give and learn and grow. And I think I can still become one of the best, given the right circumstances."

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I wanted to ask about your removal from the team. When it was announced, FlyQuest said they wanted to move in a new direction. Did that come as a surprise to you or was it something mutual, something that you had discussed with the team beforehand?

I think there were times when we discussed a lot of takes on how we wanted to progress with CS. No matter what, I think it was a good fundamental understanding from everyone. Everyone knew how they wanted to play. And for me, I have a different view on things and I think they grew and decided they wanted to have a different view on things as well.

So I think from there on, it was just the best-case scenario for them to basically bench me because with all the bad results, like three bad results in a row, it was going to be quite difficult to get yourself back on the road. And I think the only sensible thing to do was just to kind of like have a little mental reset with getting a new player and whatnot and get that energy back.

In Melbourne, I talked to Vexite, and he said that you and the team did not see CS the same way and that there were a lot of discussions from the moment you joined about how to approach the game. Can you explain from your point of view the struggles that you had as an IGL to put your imprint on the team? And would you say there was some resistance from the players in terms of the way you wanted to play the game and to structure the whole team?

I think everyone tried their best to play how I wanted to. And I think [head coach] erkaSt and I saw it the same way. But I think the troubles came from the inconsistencies with practice. It really dawned on us when four of us are from Australia and one of us is from Europe, we had like the first couple of months of playing together, and essentially what happened was that there were a lot of directions that each player wanted to take, and it wasn’t a thing that we had really discussed beforehand.

And yeah, it just came as a surprise with many new ways of people seeing CS and whatever. And it's good that everyone's growing in their own way. But as soon as that kind of happens, and this happens for a lot of teams where people see things in a different way or they’re watching a new team or the best team play a different way and get a way of thinking, then it’s just going to create a lot of drama with how we want to play together.

So unfortunately, we just didn't see it the same way, and I think it would have created a lot more conflicts and all that.

Were those issues already there when aliStair was on the team?

I wouldn't say so. I think it came down to a more practice kind of thing. We only had like a couple of days of practice between events this year compared to when all of us were in Australia, when we at least would practice with Australian teams and get things drilled a lot more.

aliStair and regali have really different qualities. aliStair is extremely versatile with utility and everything, constantly supporting and having people’s backs, while regali is a young gun, super sharp and everything. And I think it was just a big shock and awe when regali came into the team, and it took a lot of learning how to redevelop things. Because even before I came, these guys had been playing together for years. So they had their own ways of thinking about CS already.

You were supposed to go to Melbourne with FlyQuest; you were part of the roster when the invites were announced. An event like this is always a big deal for Australian players and fans. How did it feel for you to not be able to attend that event and compete on the biggest of stages in Australia?

It definitely hurts a little bit. I think when you're benched and whatnot, you’re always going to be frustrated and mad. And to be honest, I was a bit frustrated and mad because the next couple of months [after the benching], I was going to give everything, more than I usually gave, to my team, the staff and everything. But I think as soon as it hit me, it definitely hurt. But for me as a player, I need to just kind of deal with it and learn from it, and during this time, grow with it as a person and human being.

I wanted to get your thoughts on your time with FlyQuest. Because there were times when it felt like the team was heading in the right direction. For example, there were some promising signs at IEM Chengdu, your first event. Also your victory in Atlanta with a great performance from aliStair, for example. But there were a lot of painful lows as well, like EPL 20 or the Shanghai Major, where you won two BO1s and then you lost three BO3s in a row. How would you describe your time with FlyQuest?

I think it was a productive time. I think when I joined the team, we were ranked 45th or 50th in the world, and being able to post good results and push ourselves at EPL and Chengdu to get to 14th in the world really showed that the Australian community has it in them because that was just a core of five Australian players. And yeah, I think no matter what, you're going to have your ups and downs.

And obviously, having a lot of ups is much better. But I think everyone on that team is a great bunch of guys. And no matter what, losing and whatever hurts everyone's feelings. But everyone always has a good mentality to push through and really has that Aussie battler mentality to always keep growing and learning. And I think in that time, no one felt too down when we were losing and always kept pushing. So it made those bad times a lot easier for me as an IGL when I see my teammates, my coach and the staff around us supporting us the way they did.

But how would you explain that lack of consistency, at least when you had an Australian roster, before regali came in? You said that when you had regali, practicing was an issue at times. But back when you had aliStair, why do you think that the team wasn't able to be more consistent year-round?

I think maybe the reason why we weren't able to be consistent was the lack of high-quality practice. We bootcamped from time to time, which FlyQuest always allowed us to. But compared to when I played in Europe, you would get home and have the ability to instantly practice without jet lag, like 95% of the time. When you come back to Australia, the next day, you're mentally checked out for the next four or five days.

So it's like that kind of thing ruins consistency because your momentum after an event, even though you might be losing, is just slowed down by so much from that jet lag. And then you kind of have to build back. And then from there, we also have to remember, ‘Oh, this is what we're good at and everything,’ because it's very taxing. So I don't really know. I can't really pinpoint things exactly as to why it wasn't always the best results. It simply just wasn't.

It's just how it is with CS, to be honest. We're playing CS2 where consistency is very, very difficult, unless you’re Vitality. For us to even be posting some of these results against these top teams is already crazy enough.

It's been almost two months since you were benched. What have you been up to? How are you spending your days? Are you practicing every day, just waiting for the phone to ring? Are you watching tournaments to stay up to date on the meta?

I try to watch all the CS I can watch, and I play little bits here and there. But my biggest focus was that basically when, say, from 2018 to 2023, my mentality was always the best, and it was probably due to my health and everything like that.

So rather than having the mindset, the typical mindset or gaming mindset, that I should be grinding more games, I should play more FACEIT or whatever, I tried to take a step back and understand where the happiness from CS came, and it was from my day-to-day life. And from there I realized that I need to just focus on myself as a human rather than a professional CS player, and do things such as just going to gym and walking and getting sun and going to the beach, going to the rainforest, going to see friends, like those things I couldn't do for the last six years of my life.

And yeah, I think I'm getting the heavy lifts and now I'm becoming a full gym bro, and I'm happy, and that's where I want to continue with myself as a person and in CS as well.

I wanted to ask you a little bit about your prospects. The situation in Oceania isn't the best, and there's not a lot of support outside of FlyQuest. With that being said, are you looking to go abroad again, maybe join a European or North American team? What sort of inquiries have you had so far?

Obviously, you have to keep as much a secret as possible, but I think we have to wait until at least the Major comes to an end to kind of get things going again. I would love to be able to have the opportunity to play in Europe again. I've talked to some people about it, and it's definitely a possibility.

I would love to kind of just really just re-immerse myself in European CS as much as possible. I'll be fine with NA if you're able to go over to Europe a lot more, but the main thing would be I would love to kind of play or lead a European team and just like a multicultural team.

And then secondly, like I think I always still have like that like strength and mentality to kind of really want to bring up the Australian scene as much as possible, and if there was actually any support that was like as good as FlyQuest or even to 5% of what FlyQuest did for us, I think I would love to also be able to like bring up the Australian scene because I think I see a lot of people in the community who are just pushing themselves with their own money with whatever to kind of develop the scene, and I think FlyQuest are going to do really well in the next coming events, and that could just be the ticket to getting a second Major spot for an Australian team and that's where the investment should be as well.

And do you think there's enough talent out there to put together a second team that can be competitive, locally or even internationally?

Locally, I would say yes. I think it's all about how everyone views CS together. I've definitely been looking at players, just going through random streams in the Australian community and looking at people and just like getting a feel for players. I definitely know that there's a higher level that people can like strive to within this country because everyone needs, not to toot my own horn, more leadership and to learn how to grow as players, and I think I can always offer that to anyone.

There was a lot of hype when you joined MOUZ back when you were this high-fragging IGL. There was also a lot of hype when you took over Grayhound again, after fnatic. What lessons have you learned from those projects, and how would you say you have evolved as an IGL over the years?

I think from the days of MOUZ, I was much more like free-flowing. I think I had like a lot of experienced players playing with me back then, like ropz and frozen. And I learned so much from them in terms of like how to be patient and whatnot and how to definitely command and lead with my voice and everything like that. Those are the main things that I'll take with me from Europe, and how to deal with and talk to people.

And then with my time in Grayhound, the biggest thing would be how to grow as a person. There was hype about me and whatnot, but there was always like growth that I needed to have. I was never the person who assumed that the hype meant I was done with my work. So even when joining Grayhound, I knew that I had a lot of work to do as a person and player to kind of grow into the role. And even now I still always look to strive to become a better person, however I can, and utilize my teammates and their feedback to kind of grow as well.

One of the main criticisms of you that I've come across is that some people don't think that you know how to get the best out of your AWPers. A lot of that came from your time on MOUZ because acoR struggled a lot, I’d say, under you. And you were just saying that you had some issues with regali, just recently. So I wanted to get your thoughts on that criticism.

I don't think we had any issues with regali, just to correct, because I think from the moment he joined, he was playing really well. It’s just that he was different from aliStair. It was just more fragger than being able to throw every single grenade in the world. That’s what the difference was. Nothing else.

With acoR, I think we just didn't really speak that much. And that's why I wanted to grow as a person to be able to learn things from people and my teammates. Because we didn't really speak and learn from each other and share thoughts. And that's how we were as humans, as well. And that's why I failed in that aspect and how we didn't see eye to eye.

So it's just those kinds of things.You kind of just need to learn how they are and then also be able to talk to them to get the best out of them. Because at the end of 2022, I had the best time with torzsi, frozeN, xertioN and JDC. Because those people make it easy to talk to them, learn from and grow with. So I think that's the biggest thing that was probably limiting me and AWPers, if anything. But I wouldn't say I have a strong view on how people should operate. I just believe they should be able to do whatever they want.

Finally, Chris, you’re 30 years old. What do you think that you still have left to achieve? What goals do you have, and are you still confident in your abilities to lead a team at the highest level?

Yeah, as I read in apEX’s interview, you only start getting better at 30. He's only doing all these things at 30, as well. It's just basically the mindset, and that's really it. The time and the body aren't limiting you as much as in other physical sports.

So I have so much more to give and learn and grow. And I think I can still become one of the best, given the right circumstances. But as always, it's going to be difficult, and as confident as you are in yourself, there are another 500 top players also confident in themselves, so I just want to do my best to give myself the opportunity to lead and frag and whatnot. And if that time says no, then I'll do whatever I can to give back to CS and the community that've done so much for me.