PaiN's coach Enrique "rikz" Vaku discussed the potential peak of his team in a recent interview with HLTV.org, expressing confidence that they could break into the top 5 in the world within six months.
"I believe our maximum potential is reaching the top 5 in the world because we have many young players: nqz is 18 or 19 years old, snow is 17, and all of them came from academies or lower-tier teams. I’m not entirely sure yet, but we are certainly aiming high.
I think hitting our peak level is a matter of six months. We’ve been together for about a year, not counting snow, with whom we’ve been playing for four or five months. I think we need another six months, and we’ll be ready with an excellent map pool."
Vaku also explained why paiN and other South American teams lag behind their European counterparts.
"Once we lost in Cologne and ended up at the airport with the team that lost at the same time. They were about to board their flight and said they’d be home in two hours, while we thought we’d be home in two days and would return to training only in three days. You lose days and hours of training, which delays us a bit.
But I don’t think that’s the main reason. The main reason is that we have many tournaments because we are not partners with ESL or other organisations, so we have to participate in many smaller tournaments to get invitations. We need to play everywhere we’re invited, and it ends up being a bit exhausting."
For context, paiN's roster was defeated by Eternal Fire in the third round of the lower bracket at BetBoom Dacha Belgrade Season 2, finishing in fourth place and earning $35,000 in prize money.