lurppis: "We're an entirely new team"

We sat down with Power Gaming captain Tomi "lurppis" Kovanen and discussed with him his new challenge and his departure from Evil Geniuses.

The Finnish veteran made headlines in December when EG announced they had parted with him and installed Andrew "Irukandji" Timmerman in his place.

After guiding the team to success at international competitions, which included first-place finishes at GameGune Mexico and MSI Beat It, the decision came as a surprise to many and resulted in Kovanen returning to Finland after almost two years abroad.

Kovanen has returned to Power Gaming, the team he had left in 2009 while still known as Crack Clan, and he looks set to put Finland back on the Counter-Strike map this year, starting at ASUS Winter, the team's first LAN event.

In this interview, Kovanen talks about his exit from the American team, what his new life in Finland will be like and also his expectations for the new Power Gaming roster in 2011.

Looking back at your exit from Evil Geniuses, you were released shortly after leading the team to the gold at MSI Beat It. Did that decision come as a surprise to you?

We had some underlying problems in the team outside of the game that were probably never going to be fixed without a player change and I have the least in common with everyone in the team. Some of the players at EG have been questioning my motivation ever since I started staying in Oregon even though I haven't had any problems in that department, I just choose to do what makes me happy over having a lower ping. There are some personality clashes on the team which only got worse once gfn (the glue of the team holding everyone together and solving all arguments like Warden before him) quit. One of the players even got cut last Spring for a few days until we decided there were no suitable replacements in the US and took him back.

A month has passed since you left the team. Is there any bad blood between you and some of the players?

Some players I'm still friends with and some I haven't spoken to since ESEA finals a few months ago, that's pretty much how it goes in most teams, I would guess.

How would you describe your impact on EG during your time there?

Anyone can see how the results and the community's general opinion of EG changed during those 1,5 years and make up their own mind. Before I joined in, they placed 5-6th at KODE5 USA and before I quit we won an international event beating fnatic in the finals, so we definitely got a lot better; how much credit goes to me is up to you. Although I know if a few things would have gone our way our results could have been even better, I'm still happy about how we performed, given the circumstances.

lurppis with EG at MSI Beat It

After some time in a fully professional team, what will be the changes to your everyday life, now that you will return to Finland?

My entire life style will change pretty much and I plan on just keeping myself as busy as possible. I have gotten nicely into running already in the US so I will try to keep that up back home and combine it with school, floorball a few times a week, gym four times a week and playing CS at Power Gaming and I shouldn't find myself bored too often. On the community side of things, I also blog in Finnish on http://www.SETT.fi, in English on http://www.powergaming.com and do articles/videos on ESEA and WinOut sites. I might even have something else in store for the future, but I can't talk about it yet.

It has been almost two years since you were last seen playing for a Finnish team. How different is today’s "lurppis" when compared to the one from 2009?

It's hard for me to tell what has changed since it has been happening slowly for me, but it would probably be pretty easy for the Power Gaming guys to point out if you asked them a couple of months down the road. I'm sure my personality has changed a little bit since I'm two years older and I've most likely changed in-game as well. As far as calling strats goes, I think I got better playing with gfn getting some real feedback from another strat caller (which I've never really had before) and also learning to work around different personalities and playing styles.

You join the team while your brother, "naSu", leaves it. Why did he decide to become inactive?

He's been kind of tired of CS for a long time now, partly due to not getting much out of it and like me he's not a big fan of traveling anymore after all these years, so he's decided to focus on his real life which is a smart move for him. I would have absolutely loved to play with him again and I think so would have everyone on this team, there's a reason why he has been a main stay in Finland's #1 team since 2005.

Having decided to return to Europe, did you ever think about joining a non-Finnish team?

Nah, it just wasn't even in the cards.

Natu and contE have also called strategies at times during the past. Who will be leading the tactical department in the team?

Both contE and natu have actually only called strats in their past teams due to not having a "real" in-game leader in the line-up, whenever I have played with either one I have been the in-game leader and that will continue in Power Gaming as well.

lurppis returns as PG captain

contE has just returned from a period on the sidelines after serving in the military. Do you think he will be ready in time for your next events?

This is a question you should ask him or someone who has already played with him. Since I'm still in the US right now, I haven't had the chance to play with or against him or even see him play yet, but I know he's been playing plenty of CS so I'm not too worried. He said he still has fun playing which ultimately is the most important thing, so I think he will be back to his old self in no time.

Considering the numerous changes that have taken place in teams across the globe, how do you think that Power Gaming will fare?

I'm not sure if it's fair to compare us to the top teams that have been changing players yet, since we're an entirely new team (changing the in-game leader and another core player, I would say this is a completely new team rather than a Power Gaming with two player changes) and it will take us some time to get back into the groove. I do think and hope we will be where I left off with EG in a couple of months though, and that shouldn't be an unrealistic expectation. It all depends on how many tournaments we get to go to and how much we get to practice before them.

What tournaments will Power Gaming attend in the future?

We will participate in the EPS Nordic qualifier online on the 11-12th February and then hopefully attend ASUS Winter in Kiev later that month. Besides that I don't even know of any events happening before June (when I will come back to the US for at least part of the Summer) so I can't really answer that for now. I really hope there are going to be more tournaments, though, or it will be next to impossible for anyone to keep up their motivation.

What kind of practice regime will the team have for these events?

We won't have time to bootcamp before ASUS Winter but we will try to practice Sunday through Thursday from around 7pm till 10-11pm or so depending on how our schedules permit. Obviously the ten days or so of practice we will have before our first event won't be nearly enough to be playing up to our potential but these guys have been playing together for a while and I have played together with all of them in the past so I think we should be able to compete. New teams have shown to be hard to play against (e.g. fnatic winning IEM Europe) so if we can get in a decent amount of practice and things click we could do very well already at our first tournament.