innocent: "We played really off in this tournament"

"I think everyone was playing just average," the Polish captain said. "Just lower than average. Which is bad."

Venom were eliminated from Birch Cup in 9th-12th place following losses to Partizan and Monte either side of a walkover win against Gentle Mates, who withdrew from the tournament.

The Polish team couldn't get to double digits on any of the three maps they lost, leaving captain Paweł "⁠innocent⁠" Mocek scratching his head for answers.

Date	Matches
Birch Cup 2025
27/09/2025	Venom Finished 4:13 Partizan	Match
27/09/2025	Monte Finished 2:1 Venom	Match

"I'm not really sure how to fix that, because, as I said, in the bootcamp everything was looking perfect," he said. "And honestly, I never would have expected us to play this badly in this tournament."

Venom will have only a few days to work on their mistakes before the trip to the United States for Fragadelphia. Later in October, the team will also travel to Malta for the Thunderpick World Championship – an event that "could set us up for the start of 2026."

"But we cannot play there as we're doing right now, because it was really bad, to be honest," he said. "There is no reason to sugarcoat it. We played poorly individually."

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Your team has been eliminated from Birch Cup after losing to Monte. What happened in this match?

I'm not really sure about this one. I think we played really off in this tournament, especially the first game.  I wouldn't get that much into the details about this one, but it was just a disaster by us.  And right now, I'm not sure. We had a bootcamp where we fixed the maps that were a problem for us. After qualifying for the Thunderpick World Championship, we hit a crazy slump. I don't know how that is possible. We had a fantastic win and after that, we lost basically everything we could.

 We were winning more pistols than usual, but somehow we just couldn't convert rounds that we should. That's basically it. Those two maps were pretty off, and especially on Nuke, we were losing like 5-0 or something on the CT side. It's pretty tough. I think we made some crucial mistakes in the first buy round, which made it pretty hard to come back. On Dust2, I have no idea. We had a pretty good T side in practice, and even before, when we played Monte, we lost the pistol and we had six rounds anyway. And now we won the pistol and we had three. It's obviously not good. Maybe we will have some time to fix stuff before Fragadelphia.

Will Thunderpick be the most important event of the year for you?

I think so. If you looked at the VRS, the chances were slim, but I'm pretty sure that after losing the Birch Cup it's impossible to make the Major. So we will basically go to Fragadelphia to get some wins to get higher in the rankings. Thunderpick will be a big, big chance for us to gain a lot of points because we'll play against much, much higher competition, and it could give us a lot, I guess. It could set us up for the start of 2026.

But we cannot play there as we're doing right now, because it was really bad, to be honest. There is no reason to sugarcoat it. We played poorly individually. Even when we had good rounds, we didn't do well enough on an individual level. It's pretty disappointing.  We put in a lot of time into playing in the bootcamp and we hoped we would be ready for the events, but somehow, everyone played equally badly in this tournament, which is never good. We never had a player popping off on any map, and I think everyone was playing just average. Just lower than average. Which is bad.

After this defeat, you're now 48th in the VRS. Do you plan to continue with the same roster after fight for a Major spot next year? Or is it too early to say?

 I think it's pretty tough to say if we will consider changes. I guess we obviously want to continue together. That was the plan. But everything will depend on what happens at the end of the year. Because players can get offers and stuff. Sometimes, you can have an influence on that, sometimes you just cannot. It depends on the offer.

Obviously, we like this team. We know the peak is pretty high and that we can play much, much better than what we showed here. Because we played weak, and the last online games were also weak. I'm not really sure how to fix that, because, as I said, in the bootcamp everything was looking perfect. And honestly, I never would have expected us to play this badly in this tournament. It was obviously possible that we would not make it because we had tougher opponents, like Monte, who also beat us online.  But I really expected us to play a bit better than this.

We will just keep working, see what happens online and at Thunderpick, and then in the future.

After winning Fragadelphia, kisserek decided to leave the roster and was replaced by hfah. How has your game changed after this transfer?

 I think it had a big influence on how we play because we basically took hfah from a completely different role. Judging from the comms they had in Betclic, we believe he has what it takes to replace kisserek in those roles.

 But obviously, kisserek is a bit more lively as a person, I would say, more extrovert and stuff. So he screamed a lot when things were going well. He was doing a lot of good stuff in terms of atmosphere and stuff. And he had all the freedom he wanted in the game. So it was also much easier for me to call because he would chime in every time to actually say something. And hfah needs to learn this stuff. He needs to learn how to let himself loose because he also had every opportunity, every single round, to do it, if he wanted to. But it will take some time for him to develop in this role. On some maps, he's fantastic, but on others, he's lacking still.

 But I think once he is ready with this stuff, once he works a bit and watches some demos of better players in these positions, he can be a fantastic player on these spots. This would close the gap. But other than that, I think it's good. He is obviously a bit different, but I think the gap has been filled pretty great and it was working really nice. As I said, in practice it was really, really good lately. But here, I don't know if it was a stress test with the first time together or something, but it just wasn't good enough.

You've been playing under Venom for a few weeks now. For a while, you were playing as KOLESIE. Why did you leave Rebels?

Long story short, without saying any bad stuff, I think just Rebels wasn't ready to be the organization we wanted it to be in the current day and age. We need to go to bootcamps, we need to go to VRS tournaments and stuff. And this was just impossible in the organization. Our main point was to leave it because it wouldn't have made sense for us to stay and play online. Maybe this tournament doesn't show it, but we've always felt better in offline tournaments. Rebels just couldn't do it. Venom wants to do it and they're able to do everything that is possible for us. We cannot pay them back with results like this in here. We need to focus more on doing a better job.

 I think it's a big disappointment for us in terms of paying back to the organization that took us in. We will take it the hard way, and we will try to work on that to fix it immediately.

Do you think in the future some big organizations might reach out to flayy?

I think so. He has had some offers from good teams, but I wouldn't say it would have been a big leap for him. It was maybe better sometimes financially, maybe a little bit better ranking-wise, but in my eyes, those offers weren't good enough for him. And it's okay that he decided to stay with us.

Obviously, if the right team comes for him, it's possible that he will go. He's a big talent and I hope we can spend as much time with him and teach him more stuff. Because he has already improved drastically. He is a completely different player than he was a year ago. So I think it's great he is staying. He has good freedom here. He feels good. He improves a lot. So if someone approaches him, it's up to him, but I hope he will stay for as long as possible.