Last week it was League of Legends, and now we are back to CS:GO. Ivan “choiv7” Živković, iNation’s In-Game Leader, talked to us about his team’s first A1 Adria League season, their perfect SWISS stage as well as other things related to iNation’s development and recent results. You can read everything choiv7 had to say below:
Before focusing on A1 Adria League, let’s talk about your recent results. You qualified for the IESF World Championship LAN in Israel. How did that whole tournament go? Seeing the rest of the qualified teams, what do you think your chances are of placing high or even winning the whole thing?
Our group was a decent one I would say, we had to beat either [EC] Kyiv or Czech Republic to get out of the groups, so we beat the Czechs and unfortunately lost to Kyiv 2-1. We had one day to prepare for every match which was enough I would say and we were really hyped for every match we played. there are good teams that qualified for the main event, we will see how it goes, but i believe that we can get to the end of the tournament, atleast finish in the top 4.
Back to the A1 Adria League. It seems like you have an easier time against BLUEJAYS than their rivals, PORTUGAL. You beat them in the League, and you were better than them in Kuvo’s OneTap tournament. What is the main difference between these two squads? Why does playing BLUEJAYS seem easier? Is their playstyle not suited to yours or is it something else?
BLUEJAYS are really good opponents and also a good team. Against teams that play structured CS like them it is much easier to have a plan and prepare before the game so we were really prepared for them. The main difference between PORTUGAL and BLUEJAYS is that the former is a mix and the other team is a regular team. If mix team stars pressuring you from the start and you can’t addapt, it is really hard to come back and stop their momentum.
After losing to them on two occasions, you finally outplayed PORTUGAL. What makes PORTUGAL such a hard team to beat? What did you do differently in this match that helped you win?
For us main problem against mix teams is adaptation, we rarely play against mix teams and we need to learn to adapt faster when that happens. We make a lot of mistakes and they punish us for that. This last match, we were down 1-0 on their map pick and before the 2nd map we just told each other to adapt faster and talk more in TeamSpeak about what they are doing so we can all be focused, which happend, and we didn’t lose any force/eco rounds like on Map 1.
Which team surprised you the most this season and why?
In my opinion, there are no surprises in this season. There are 5-6 teams that are equal, and I’m happy that we are the first team that qualified because it’s hard to say which teams will qualify for top4.
Besides you, which three teams do you think will make it through to the playoffs?
I think 4glory, Marten and BLUEJAYS will make it to playoffs because they are all well prepared. I can’t wait to see the remaining matches!
We completely agree with you choiv, we can’t wait to watch the remaining matches as well. Don’t forget to tune in this Sunday, and every next Sunday until the playoffs, to watch the best Adriatic CS:GO teams fight for the 5.000€ prize pool.