SK Gaming did not go far in the Counter-Strike: Global Offensive tournament at ESL One Belo Horizonte.
The Brazilian team survived the group stage even after losing the first series of the event to the Turkish players of Space Soldiers. The Brazilians recovered in the tournament against Ghost and triumphed in a rematch against Space Soldiers in the decider match of Group A at the Mineirinho Arena on Friday.
In the semifinal against the Europeans of mousesports, SK Gaming was eliminated with a 2-0 scoreline in front of the Brazilian crowd on Saturday afternoon. Silence reigned in the arena.
Ricardo “Boltz” Prass from SK Gaming talked with Dot Esports about the Belo Horizonte tournament and the general feeling of the team on Sunday after their elimination—he felt like he could have done more.
SK Gaming has been underperforming recently. How much of this comes from your team’s performance drop and how much from the improvement of other teams?
Boltz: Surely there are no teams you can’t lose against anymore. Every team is a champion of a different tournament. Everyone is improving, everyone practices all day long, everybody works very hard to improve. We’re not the only ones who want to improve. All other teams are professional enough to improve every tournament. We also try in every tournament to fix some mistakes. We improve some things and other things pop up. It’s common. We’re improving, evolving, and we reach our level shortly.
Some analysts say that SK seems to be going through an identity crisis after the recent roster changes. What do you think?
We’ve been a quite recent team since Stewie joined. I think it has not even been three months yet. We continue adapting to new things, to what he likes to do, to what we like to do for him. Then, we are still learning a lot of things: how to play and how to form the team with our five players around characteristics that we like to play around. It’s an evolution. We improve every tournament, and we will keep our focus and work towards it.
What do you think of the team’s performance overall, and your individual performance?
We have not been performing as well as a team as we expect. I’m not happy with my in-game performance. I know that I can be better, and I’m not even close to what I can deliver. My confidence is not as good as it was last year, at the end of the year, when we were doing very well. But we try to keep our focus, keep our minds well to work and to continue improving. We need not to be discouraged.
Despite these difficulties, what do you believe you still bring to SK?
I’m quite a calm guy. I don’t have a problem of stressing out during the game that much, like thinking about what went wrong, this kind of thing. I try to be joyful during the game, keeping everyone’s mind well. We always try our maximum, regardless of whether the game is difficult or not, we always try to maintain our focus. It’s something that I bring a lot to the team.
ESL One Cologne is one of the next championships SK will compete in. What do you want to work on as a team before Cologne so you can be your best?
Some mistakes that we need to work on always appear every tournament. We fix one, and another appears. The team is new, we have some communication problems, and something new that is making calls in English. We try to improve individually, as a team, and tactically to do our best until ESL One Cologne to go after another title for Brazil and for our team.
Regarding the issues with talking in English, are they solved in-game?
I would say that it’s almost 90 percent solved. In the beginning, it was quite difficult, especially in big championships, under pressure. But today, I would say that it is a very small problem. There is one thing or another that is lost, which comes up as a problem. It is not like Portuguese, which is our native tongue, but soon I think it will be 100 percent.
This interview has been edited for clarity. Jamie Villanueva contributed to this article.
