stanislaw: [jdm64] has been sacrificing too much

Liquid got into the decider match of group B after winning over fnatic earlier today with a 2-1 scoreline.

stanislaw thinks that having set roles is working well for Liquid

Before his team plays a rematch against Astralis to close out the second day at ECS, we got hold of Peter "⁠stanislaw⁠" Jarguz to hear about how his team has been developing in the recent months.

I want to start with a bit about the roles in the team. Especially with Twistzz coming in and you maybe being a peripheral role player and him being a similar, lurk style player. How did you fit all the roles and how do you see that developing?

I think our roles are really set and it's good for us, it lets us be more organized. Myself, I really like to lurk and that is my best role I think. When I have an idea for myself to lurk, it's kind of hard to explain it, that is when I tell Twistzz just to go with them, but otherwise, he also has some good ideas and if he says it to me then I just let him do it. There is a bit of freedom between him and me, we can just change it up who lurks, but most of the time it's going to be me.

Talking about your players as well, jdm64 has been one of the best at times, then had a big dip in form and now he is coming back slowly. How did you approach the jdm64 issue? The AWPing in Liquid has historically been something the team struggled with. With you coming in, how has that been going on?

Like you said, AWPing in Liquid hasn't been good. I don't think he has been comfortable, he has been sacrificing too much, he has been more of a support AWPer rather than us supporting him, which is how it should be. Because when he has confidence it shows, he can hit any shot and can make any play he wants. What I've been trying to do with him and he's been trying to really improve on is to get his confidence back and also just make a lot more plays for himself. When he gets in the rhythm he is a lot better, we just have to support him more instead of him supporting us.

You see him also like an aggressive AWPer, someone that wants to take control of the map?

Yeah, that is the kind of AWPer I'd like him to be. He has been so passive for so long, but he has been getting better every single event. But yeah, that's how I think the meta should be, the AWPer should be getting the first kills the most.

Coming here, what was the mindset, mentality, what were the goals for you as a team?

We are slowly just building. Our last event, ESL Pro League, our goal was to get out of groups and we managed to finish in the semi-final. And here it's the same thing, we just want to make it out of the groups to make the semi-finals but we have a tough match ahead against Astralis, a rematch.

Let's touch on the games here, you started against Astralis, that was on Inferno. It seemed like a close match, what was the difference between winning and losing, for you, in that game?

Against Astralis on Inferno, we honestly weren't too disappointed we lost because we actually played pretty well. It's just that all these small little details went wrong and every single round... someone wouldn't be ready for a push or someone missed a smoke or we just didn't win a certain clutch. It wasn't our strategies and it wasn't our attitude or anything like that, anything major, it was just the small mistakes. We just went back after the match and said, ok, we didn't get outplayed our anything, we lost in the small details, so we went to the hotel, talked about it and fixed our small issues.

With that in mind, coming into the fnatic game today, they just finished second at DreamHack Summer, how did you feel coming into the game against the Swedes?

fnatic has always been purely based on skill so we know it's going to be a tough match, always. Still, we were ready for it, we are always trying to focus on our game and not worry too much about the other team because we've done the whole anti-strat thing before. So we didn't really look into them too much, we played our game and fixed our mistakes from the previous day.

The last map seemed pretty easy for you, what was the key to closing them out? I think that at DreamHack Summer someone from their team mentioned that they were one of the best teams on Inferno, but it didn't seem like that against you?

When we get into this kind of rhythm I think we just play perfect CS and no matter what they do we just win. For them, I don't really know what happened, but every single round we had an idea, we went with it and it worked. Games like that don't really happen too often, where every idea works, but this time it did and we all just played really well together. We had insane teamwork I think.

How much does zews help you? Coming from OpTic to here, back then you didn't have a coach and here you have zews and you can combine with him - how does he come into the picture?

I think having a coach is extremely important, every team should have one. It helps, when I have don't have an idea to call a strategy he will notice that I am slowing down or I'm not in my rhythm. Also, if he notices something, because he is watching five different screens, he will usually give an idea. Also, if we are getting down, not communicating, then he is also there to help us. He just makes the environment better and really makes sure everyone gives it their all.

You are going to be playing against Astralis again in the BO3 decider to get out of the groups. You lost to them before, what do you expect and how do you plan to win against them now?

Like I said before, when we lost on Inferno it was small details and I think we fixed them for the most part. We are just going to go in the game and do what we always do and focus on our self. Hopefully, our teamwork will be as good as it was against fnatic, our teamwork needs to stay as it is and we need to keep playing as we are.