Assistant coach of the South American team FURIA, Vyacheslav "innersh1ne" Britvin, commented on his team's advancement to the semi-finals of IEM Rio 2024 for Counter-Strike 2 following their victory over NAVI in the group stage. The Russian esports player expressed particular satisfaction in defeating the world’s top team according to HLTV.
"To be honest, it was an excellent, focused performance from us. There's nothing more to add. When we play as we know we can, like we do in practice, it doesn’t matter who the opponent is. Personally, it’s especially gratifying to beat NAVI since they are the best in the world. We’re playing in the semi-finals on Saturday in a fiery home arena!
Before Rio, it was quite nerve-wracking, though. Firstly, we ended up in a death group (Liquid, NAVI, FaZe, MOUZ). With such a group and a BO1 opening match, you can easily end up in the top 16. Looking at our run through the group, we faced the #5, #6, and #1 teams in the world, which was tough.
Secondly, it was unclear how the long break between tournaments would affect us, despite having worked 100% for 2.5 weeks in practice. We arrived in Rio in great shape; it turned out we had plenty of time and a good focus on the challenges ahead.
From our Pro League and BetBoom Dacha results, it became clear that our attack was in good tactical and systematic shape (it didn’t take much time for such an experienced captain as FalleN to adapt our play, as we worked through many things), and this allowed us to:
1) Strengthen our weak map pool;
2) Address gaps in our defence;
3) Make targeted changes and refinements to our attack on certain maps;
4) I managed to dedicate a lot of time and focus on one-on-one work with players, which yielded results.
Now we need to focus on fighting for victory in Rio and aim to maintain our success in the long run.
Haters, don’t forget to say that MOUZ, FaZe, and NAVI are out of form and that we just got lucky."
As a reminder, IEM Rio 2024 takes place from October 7 to 13 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, with a prize pool of $250,000. The winner will also receive an invite to IEM Katowice 2025. In the playoffs, FURIA will face the winner of the Vitality vs. MOUZ match.