Interview with Complexity’s EliGE: “I think we can climb much higher and very quickly.”

Ahead of the playoffs of ESL Pro League S18, we spoke to EliGE from Complexity and asked him a few questions. Here’s the interview:

Why did you choose to stay in North America when Liquid moved to Europe?

When I was trying to decide which teams I could join, I was mainly looking at the competitiveness of each one and trying to make sure that I was actually going to be able to compete. Because I don’t want to join a team that’s going to get owned.

That was the first and most important thing for me: making sure that I was going to have a strong team. If I could have joined a team that is a lot more competitive, that would have made sense and compensated for the amount of stress that moving to EU would bring.

But I felt like the teams that were offered to me weren’t good enough. I wasn’t interested in joining a team that doesn’t have a chance of going anywhere. When I was looking at Complexity’s roster, I thought the team had a lot of good pieces and the potential to compete at the level that I wanted to be at.

We’re a little bit more experienced compared to some of the other teams. I felt like with some time, by bringing my ideas to Complexity, I would be able to bring the roster to a high competitive level relative to Europe’s. I was doing this back when I was competing for Liquid and I thought I could do the same thing for Complexity.

Other than that, I love being on an NA team and staying in NA. But that doesn’t mean I would rule out competing in Europe.

How have you changed as a player in the past three months? Were you required to adapt to a different role or playstyle? Or are you allowed to play your usual game when competing for Complexity?

I didn’t have to change my roles except on two maps. The main change for me when I came to Complexity was more of a mentality shift. Because I’m the veteran on this team who is expected to be the helpful voice when things are getting tough. Understanding that I have that role on the team and accepting to play it has been the main change.

Were you offered the option to become the team’s IGL?

No. The team already has a good IGL. I just came in to play my role and help out with complicated situations that require my level of experience.

Is your input important when creating tactics and strategies as a team? Or is that decided by your coach and the IGL only?

Input comes from all of us. I think it’s always important to have several players on the team who are devising strategies. Right now, it’s the coach, JT, and me who are dealing with that.

At this event, Complexity proved to be the strongest CS:GO team in North America. How high do you think you can climb in the global rankings until the end of the year? You are ranked 25^th at the moment, but you’re playing like a top 10 team.

I think that outside of the top four, the teams are separated only by a few hundred points. So I think we can climb much higher and very quickly. We’re playing extremely well. I’m not going to say that we’re a top 5 team right now. We’re still making inexperienced mistakes. But I think we’re headed in the right direction.

Who do you think will be your next opponent? Fnatic or Monte?

I think that it’s going to be Fnatic. They are a little bit more consistent as a team. But I also think that any team could beat anyone right now.

If everything goes well for your team, you’ll be facing ZywOo in the Quarterfinals. Is Vitality an intimidating opponent or do you think they can be beaten?

They can definitely be beaten. Even when we played against G2, we were close to beating them and I think we should have won that match. We played against Vitality in practice and had some really good results. Obviously, those matches are just scrims, but we know that they’re not on another level.

My teammates are super talented and just need to learn a few more easy things before we can go head to head with anyone in the world. Apart from that, all we need is the confidence that our opponents can be beaten and are not out of this world.

Ok. Thank you for the interview and best of luck against your next opponent!

Thank you!

Header: Complexity