Magisk: "I still think I have some way to go to be the reliable rock I know I can be"

The 27-year-old is happy to find some stability in Astralis after a difficult spell in Falcons.

Emil "⁠Magisk⁠" Reif was top of the scoreboard for Astralis as they defeated Natus Vincere in Chengdu's opener, but the Dane knows he has a way to go before he can say he's returned to his old level.

"For me it's just to go back to the basics and figure out what worked for me, and how I can become this reliable rock that I used to be," he explained post-game.

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Astralis beat NAVI to close IEM Chengdu day one

"As you said, it's going in the right direction but I also think it's something I need to do over a longer period of time. Doing it for a few weeks, one or two tournaments, anyone can do that. My strength has always been, not doing it for a few tournaments, but kind of always doing it, for multiple years in my career."

But Magisk says returning to Astralis, after a stark contrast of success with Vitality and failure in Falcons in his time away, is helping him get back on the road to success.

Date	Matches
IEM Chengdu 2025
03/11/2025	Astralis Finished 2:1 Natus Vincere	Match

"For one and a half years in Falcons, it drained me a lot," he continued. "It was very rough for me as a person to be there."

When asked to expand, he said, "It's not to do with that I was in that organization or anything like that. It's more about the fact that I am a person who needs stability."

Listen to the interview here.

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Congrats, win over NAVI. Bit of a slog in the end, starting with an overtime and ending with one. What's going through your mind after that one?

It's a good sign we managed to close out two overtimes. That's obviously a good thing. Both teams played decent CS today. Overall, it came down to a lot of small things for both teams. I think it could have gone either way but I'm happy it went our's today.

We've come from another tournament, where we were playing ourselves into the tournament and then had these... circumstances, and we almost beat Aurora with our coach. We are going in the right direction as a team, but we want to try and close out maps as fast as possible when we have a good lead, a good start. Obviously, there's still some work to do.

How's device feeling? Is he back to normal?

He is back to normal. It's a long travel coming here, we didn't get much sleep. We arrived at 02:00 here. It's a long road, but we're feeling good now. We're just excited to get some sleep.

Usually his issues are exacerbated by travel, and long events, is that something you guys are working on or is it not a concern right now?

We always try and make sure that people are in a good state, both mentally and also in terms of their body. Food poisoning can happen to anyone. We were dealing with a lot of sickness throughout that tournament; he was not the only one. Sadly, he was the only one who was sick right before a game. We cannot control these things. We had two or three other people dealing with sickness, puking, and stuff like that. It's been a little bit rough coming into a tournament like that, and unfortunately, it was just device who had it right before the game.

Going back to this match. Originally, you were losing a lot of the clutches but on Inferno a couple more went your way. Tell me about turning that around.

Clutches always come down to either the enemy is making a mistake, or if we are making a mistake. There were certainly some situations on Nuke, the 3on1 against Aleksib, on the B bomb-site. These types of rounds, if you want to beat the best of the best, you have to win those.

Right now, we are trying to make it as simple as possible, and then you can always build on the momentum with small gimmick things. When you lose a lot of them, it's important to go back to the basics, play basic CS, and make sure that you have the situations, abuse the fact that you've got numbers, and stuff like that. Yeah, that kind of worked out, we talked a bit about it between maps, that we just have to go back to basics in these types of rounds. I'm not sure that's the reason it changed, but obviously if rounds started swinging our way it's a good sign.

Last time we spoke to you was just after you returned. How are you feeling now you've had a bit more time to get used to HooXi's calling and also, just bedding back in?

On the CT side, in general, I feel pretty comfortable. Obviously, there are some [new] positions, as an example, I'm playing B Short on Mirage. I think, in general, I'm doing decent on the position, but I've never played that before in my career. It is a bit new, how should I react, how should I do situations, stuff like that. In general, on CT I feel comfortable. That's why I'm back in Pit. We needed a change on Inferno, it was not working out, I at least know how to play Pit. So that's good for me, to go back to what I'm used to and what I know. It also helps me to be more reliable in mid-rounds to help the team sometimes, if we are getting too passive and stuff like that.

T side, there are a lot of positions I'm not used to playing. I'm not the main lurk. That's something I have to get used to again, playing on Silo and these types of things. I'm trying my best to work with the staff to get as much impact as possible, or at least play my role according to how we want to play. That's all I can do, focus on how I can fit into this system, how I can develop as a player. It's going in the right direction for me, obviously, there's always room for improvement, but right now I want to take one day at a time and make sure that every day, I do a little bit better.

There's a lot of work to be done in adapting to these positions, but overall, your form has been improved compared to Falcons. There were questions around where your career would head after that period. How does it feel to start finding your groove again?

It's always a good thing to see hard work pay off. I still think I have some way to go, to be in the zone I want to be in, to be the reliable rock I know I can be. Obviously, I still think there is some way to go. It comes with taking one day at a time. For one and a half years in Falcons, it drained me a lot. It was very rough for me as a person to be there. That's the way it is sometimes. It didn't click. It didn't work out. I'm happy to see them do well as well.

For me it's just to go back to the basics and figure out what worked for me, and how I can become this reliable rock that I used to be. As you said, it's going in the right direction but I also think it's something I need to do over a longer period of time. Doing it for a few weeks, one or two tournaments, anyone can do that. My strength has always been, not doing it for a few tournaments, but kind of always doing it, for multiple years in my career.

Everyone has a bad season in their career, I had one of those in Falcons. I just have to take it as a push to the shoulder that I need to do better, what I can improve on, it doesn't really matter what happened or why it happened like that. It's about focusing on what I can control, and that's to look at myself, and figure out what I need to do as a player, and how to keep improving. With that mindset, it's starting to help a little bit, but I would like to be more consistent and not have these drop-out maps I still have sometimes. That's the key for me to have success.

You said your time in Falcons drained you a lot. Can you explain why?

It's not to do with that I was in that organization or anything like that. It's more about the fact that I am a person who needs stability, I need to have stability around me. We had a lot of roster changes, players coming in and out, that's something that is very hard for me to keep changing players back and forth. That makes it difficult, especially when it's not going well for the team and the results are not coming.

That's more in terms of that way of being hard, obviously changing players is never a nice thing, it's always hard to get these small details, how people are reacting in certain situations, how do people want to play CS, do they have a different philosophy to me? I needed to adapt to this, they needed to adapt into me as well, then you sometimes end up in a middle ground trying to make everyone happy.

I'm just happy to be back, and have some stability. That's what I need to come back to my level. That's what I mean by being drained, it's hard to start over and over again. When roster changes happen, the focus on me as a player is not the primary focus because, you know, the staff team needs to get the new players into the playbook, make them comfortable, maybe the focus on practice is less on what I'm doing, if I'm making a mistake, and it's more about the new guys.

Obviously, that's a normal thing, very natural to focus on the new guys, but it meant that for a long period of time the focus was not on my development. That's something I lacked, and when I finally got the attention it was at the point where you start losing a bit of confidence in yourself, because you didn't perform at the level you are supposed to. I think that's also one of the reasons why I didn't bounce back when I was supposed to.

That's interesting, m0NESY actually said something similar about the consistency in the team and the changes making it hard for him to find consistency. You also have the advantage of being the new player in this Astralis team, so a bit of the focus is on you.

Turning to this event now, you're one match from playoffs now. You couldn't get it done in Bucharest partially because of device missing that last match, how do you feel ahead of that match tomorrow, with a lot of Chinese fans for Astralis of course.

We always go into the game with the mindset that we can win. On a good day in CS2, you can always win a game, do an upset, play good CS. It's The MongolZ from what I remember, they are also in a situation where they have a new player coming in. If things don't click in the beginning, you can win a pistol, you can win a force buy, a lot of things can happen. I believe for us as a team that it's about growing with the tournament. I think we are going in that direction. We want to keep that momentum for tomorrow.

As a team, we're trying to find the right DNA for us right now, in the sense that we want to follow what we think is the best way for us to play CS, and we're starting to get there slowly. Sometimes, we also need to take a step back because we like to be aggressive, take duels, and it's also about finding the middle ground sometimes, playing passive and relying on the bomb-sites, having the correct decisions individually but also as a team.

Coming into the game tomororow, if we do 5% better it will be a good game. Right now we're making a lot of mistakes. The fewer mistakes we make tomorrow, the better it is. CS is a lot about aim but it's also about who makes the fewest mistakes in a game. That's going to be the focus.

Date	Matches
IEM Chengdu 2025
04/11/2025	The MongolZ 09:50 Astralis	Match