cs cases2025-04-21 10:58:434

zakk: "boltz doesn't like to lead"

After we got our first DreamHack ZOWIE Open Summer finalists following Immortals' win over GODSENT, Rafael "zakk" Fernandes talked to us again about the semi-final, Ricardo "boltz" Prass taking over in-game leading, and the upcomng final.

Immortals are the first DreamHack Summer finalists after a fairly comfortable win against GODSENT, whom they beat on Cache, then lost Mirage and came out victorious on Train.

Coach Rafael "⁠zakk⁠" Fernandes talked to us once again and broke down the semi-final and the team's development throughout the tournament.

boltz feels the in-game leader role affects his game

He also touched on Ricardo "⁠boltz⁠" Prass taking over the in-game leading role and shared who he'd prefer meeting in the grand final at the end of the day.

Let's get into the veto overall, how did you feel about the individuals maps that came out and the match-up?
I was quite happy with the picks, actually, because I knew they didn't play Train a lot and Cache was not a good map for them.
What about Mirage? You had issues on it versus ENCE yesterday and GODSENT beat NiP on it in groups.
We knew it was gonna be hard, because we don't play Mirage very good. We didn't practise it too much, but we knew that if we lost we still had a third map, so we tried our best and they played a really good game. We forgot about Mirage by the time we went into Train.
You've progressed over the tournament and got better match after match, are you gaining your confidence back?
Yeah, I think so, and I think everybody hears everybody in the team, we have boltz as an in-game leader, but now everybody is giving their opinion inside the game and everybody is respected. That makes things go really well.
How is boltz adjusting as an in-game leader then?
He's okay, he doesn't like to be one. In the future we're probably going to change that, because he thinks he plays too stuck when he has to make the calls inside the game. So in the future, we're probably gonna change that, but for now he's doing okay.
Who else can lead though, could that be you or rather one of the other players?
I don't know, maybe a little bit from everybody. I'm giving some coordination inside the game as well, but these things take time, you know. We're gonna see.
In the final you'll meet either Astralis, whom you had in your group but ended up avoiding them, or NiP, do you have a preference?
I would like to play NiP, I don't know about the guys, but as I said in the post-match interview, I like the crowd. It doesn't matter if they're cheering for us or not, it's like a whole lot of energy going, so I'd like to play them.

Make sure to check out the list of interviews we have conducted so far in Jönköping to see if you missed any:

Rafael "⁠zakk⁠" Fernandes: "We were lacking confidence"
Markus "⁠pronax⁠" Wallsten: "We've been playing so much lately"
Andreas "⁠MODDII⁠" Fridh: "valde is a complete player"
William "⁠draken⁠" Sundin: "I'd prefer playing GODSENT"
Aleksi "⁠allu⁠" Jalli: "naSu brought more stability"