woxic: "Our goal is to go to semi-finals in all events. If this is your goal, you need to suffer"

Aurora's AWPer says the team are working harder than ever to achieve their goals.

Aurora have been in a shaky patch of form as of late, a situation exacerbated by the recent absence of Ismailcan "⁠XANTARES⁠" Dörtkardeş which left the team unable to practice in full for "15 days, 20 days."

Heading into Esports World Cup, Özgür "⁠woxic⁠" Eker says Aurora are determined to turn their fortunes around and raise their ceiling. "There is no excuse for any of them," he says when discussing his team's early tournament exits. "We need to be more focused on our goals because... it is not satisfying anymore to reach quarter-finals.

"Everyone wants to go further. That's why we are working harder than ever right now."

woxic sat down with HLTV ahead of his team's campaign in Riyadh to not only address their lofty goals, but also the recent collapse against The MongolZ and what his team need to do to improve.

Listen to the interview here.

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First thing I have to do is ask about that game with The MongolZ at BLAST Bounty. Obviously a rough one, give me your thoughts.

I still can't believe what happened there, and also in my regular life I'm just saying "this didn't happen, it does not exist at all. It's just a dream, a bad dream, and now we move on." Basically I am looking at it like that, otherwise I will lose my mind.

What do you think happened, or is it just one of those games that happens sometimes?

I think… yeah sometimes this kind of thing can happen, but I think only in your lifetime one or two times, and it just hit us at that time. We couldn't find a solution, people couldn't do extra to stop the comeback. They became like a snowball against us, after we made a snowball against them.

I think also, what we did and they did, is because the CT-side economy is much better right now, which I think is making this a possibility. You are able to get double-AWPs, lock down the site and stuff. I think this is more fun, and we can see this type of game more in upcoming events and days for different teams as well.

Like you say, you think the economy contributed, do you think it's a game where, if there's another month or two and you are more used to the changes, it doesn't happen?

I think so. There still needs to be time, because everyone is not understanding the economy side of Counter-Strike for CT side right now. You need to be more careful about searching, you need to try to save more guns because you are just getting extra and extra, so people have to change their mindset and playstyle at the end of the round. I think still we need time, but I think it's much better than before because when you keep winning and losing one round, you were having to eco. This way is much better and more entertainment for people who are watching.

Do you prefer playing when it's CT-sided and the economy is more forgiving?

Yeah.

In general your Mirage T sides recently have been a bit of a problem. Why do you think that is?

There's not only one reason behind it, I think we are… not so great at following each other. One thing is happening on one side, and the other side can't understand the situation. I think there must be something wrong if your T side is bad like this, the statistics are not telling everything all the time, but it can give you some hints. So definitely there is some issue with the players themselves, maybe the way of playing the map, maybe like tactical-wise, maybe people are not doing extra and not taking responsibility on themselves to do something. I think all of them just give five percent, six percent, which makes you worse playing on the T side. We will figure it out, we know how we can fix it since we are facing it (laughs), so I think in upcoming days and events it's gonna be much better.

I wanted to talk about Aurora's form in general. At the start of the year you were always top-four, always contesting deep in tournaments, whereas since PGL Astana where you came third, you have not been hitting the same heights. Why do you think that is?

I'm not counting Cologne, because we didn't play with the full lineup. We also didn't play practices with XANTARES for 15 days, 20 days. After XANTARES came back we did a reboot and everything else. Basically you keep starting again, which is what it feels like for us.

Before this, there is no excuse for any of them. We need to be more focused on our goals because we are not satisfied, you can ask anyone in the team, it's not satisfying anymore to reach quarter-finals. Since we made all the time, in the previous year and the start of the year, last eight all the time, we want to go further, everyone wants to go further. That's why we are working harder than ever right now.

Because people are improving, we have to also improve. When some other teams are improving 20 percent, we cannot just improve seven percent. It's not only a one-person thing as well, we are a whole unit, we need to be more understanding of each other and get better, individual-wise and everything-wise. I think if we catch the keys again like we had before, I think we can go more than quarter-finals right now. That's our goal, to go to finals, at least semi-finals, in all events. If this is your goal, you need to suffer, basically.

You personally had a good BLAST Bounty, it was a good tournament for you compared to the last three or four before that. Why do you think that was?

There is no specific reason for it, I am just working personally harder. I think it's about my mindset, and it's also how I'm feeling in that day. If I'm happy, everything goes into the server from my veins, but if I'm not happy and having an issue in my head, with myself or with anything which is affecting me, sometimes this (bad tournaments) happen. Most of the times I am getting rid of it when I put the headset on, but sometimes when you keep travelling and keep getting eliminated from tournaments in a bad way, you start to lose your hope a bit.

So sometimes you are losing your hope and going to the next tournament like there is no hope, you have a bad performance. Next tournament you just think "man, we can do a comeback, it's going to be much better," and you are hitting all the shots and it goes well, and you are finishing in a great place. That just shows the difference.

Personally I feel so much better than before, and I also changed some of my equipment as well, mousepad and also mouse. Maybe also because I am playing individually, like FACEIT and everything, much more than before. Maybe I am just giving my head to the game more than before, maybe this is affecting it. As I said before, everything is giving five percent, when it goes plus and plus and plus, it shows in the end in the result, or as statistics.

Looking forwards to this tournament, how are you feeling coming into it, what are your goals?

Since we failed in the previous tournament so hard, we just want to show that it was just an unlucky event and it was just an unlucky game. This is not us, we will show who the real Aurora is. That's what we want to show, and that's what we want to do.