内容摘要：We caught up with Russel "⁠Twistzz⁠" Van Dulken after his team's 2-0 victory over eUnited

We caught up with Russel "⁠Twistzz⁠" Van Dulken after his team's 2-0 victory over eUnited to talk about Liquid's quarter-final Major exit and the team's evolution since then.

Liquid, #1 in the world ranking and one of the favorites to lift the ESL One New York trophy on Sunday, kicked their tournament run off with a victory over eUnited. They will now play G2 later today for a playoff spot at the Barclays Center as the French team made back-to-back comebacks on Dust2 and Nuke in the other Group A opener against ENCE to bag the series.

Liquid have been working on changing up their approach to the game since the Major

Following the victory, Twistzz took some time to sit down with HLTV.org and talk over what happened at the StarLadder Major in Berlin, what happened before and since then as far as practice goes, and chat about some of Liquid's practice habits as well as their first match against eUnited, an almost mirrored LAN rematch of their online ECS match.

In retrospect, now that you've had some time to think after the Major, what happened? What was it that made you have a bit of a slow start, leading to being paired up with Astralis early on in the playoffs. Looking back, have you talked about why you weren't able to bring the same play as before the break?

It starts at the base and goes all the way back to practice, to our bootcamp. The two weeks before the Major were pretty rough. Our win percentage in scrims was really low, I'd say it was around 20%, and that's harsh, especially when you go from winning all of these events, so it kind of messes with you mentally. All that we could hope for was that being on LAN the intensity would kick back in over time, as usual, but that didn't happen and we started very slow on pretty much every game we played. I think our practice is what led to our fall-out at the Major.

NAF also said you guys weren't able to play enough, which could relate to why you couldn't find that ability to kickstart matches earlier. Have you had time after the Major to play a lot and work the kinks out?

We've all been playing a lot individually, I even started playing FPL again even though I hate it [laughs]. A lot of things happened through the Major break. I spent the entire break moving so it was hard to play and I felt pretty bad coming out of the break and I even told my team that I felt that way but would try my best during the bootcamp. It was just not enough time playing together and it kind of felt like we were a new team again, which is really bad. We had lost our fundamentals. Right now we're doing pretty good, there are still some communication issues that need to be brought up, we don't communicate every single thing like we used to, and that's something that needs to be on our minds at all times.

It was just not enough time playing together and it kind of felt like we were a new team again, which is really bad. We had lost our fundamentals Russel "⁠Twistzz⁠" Van Dulken on practice before the Major

Now you're in this place where you're defending the #1 place in the world against Astralis who are coming in strong after the Major. Is that something in your minds, is it added pressure, or do you think you'll be able to become consistent again and show you're the #1 team?

We're currently finding our form. We suck so much online, that's just inevitable. We're losing the ECS online qualifiers, an event we probably won't even be able to make because it's just so hard for us. The intensity is just not there and it's a different atmosphere. There are other priorities on our mind, we're looking forward to the Grand Slam, all those other things, so qualifiers are kind of whatever. We'll play them, and if we win it happens, but it's not like we put everything we have into it. I don't want to discredit anyone's wins against us online, but playing us on LAN is very different.

Talking about the ECS qualifier, you played the same two maps against eUnited except they picked Mirage and you picked Overpass, whereas here it was the other way around. The score was almost the same, though, within like a round or two. Do you think they misread the veto, perhaps, or picked wrong?

We thought they'd go for something completely different and pick Nuke or something like that because what they did before didn't work. Props to them for trying again with the new lineup although they got similar results.

Before Liquid started to become a winning team you were second here last year, where you got your first MVP medal. Your MVP photo became somewhat iconic of 2018 Liquid. What memories does ESL One New York bring back?

I completely forgot about that event like the day after, it was pretty miserable. Not because of my performance, but because we neglected the fact that we choked and it put a wall in our mind that we couldn't pass. Of course, the first step is recognizing the problem and we clearly choked as a team. At least we're past that stage now.

Do you think forgetting those events to move on to the next one was something that allowed you to get past the choking phase?

I think so, 2018 was just a storyline of second places. I can't remember what was next, but I remember we went to Chicago and carried on. I just forgot about all of last year, this year is what needs to be focused on, and right now the story is about finding ourselves again. We're doing it a different way, we're working on creating new tactics, we can't go back and touch on our old ones. We can't just say "we just need to re-run it, re-practice it, and it's going to work," because teams studied us and what we used to do, so it's up to us to create new things that other teams aren't even doing.

I just forgot about all of last year, this year is what needs to be focused on, and right now the story is about finding ourselves again Russel "⁠Twistzz⁠" Van Dulken

What are some of the things you're working on changing? Some roles, or setups, or what is it?

Our roles are really game-to-game. In a lot of our scrims lately I felt like I was supporting a lot, and in the match against eUnited I felt like I was entrying more than I used to. Things just happen depending on the situation you're in and I happened to be on a lot of entry situations this game. It is the way it is, but I'm usually in more supportive scenarios.

One thing I did want to follow-up on from earlier was that the practice somewhat hurt you going into the Major, especially hurting your confidence. You talked about playing a lot individually since the Major, but how has the team practice been going?

It's going really well. Most of the North American teams are back. Right when we got back from the Major was like our worst week of practice because teams were traveling to BLAST or other events and no one was really home. MIBR were gone, Cloud9 were gone, NRG were taking a small break after the Major... a lot of teams were making changes, too, so there were no stable rosters except like the top teams, Cloud9, NRG, and us, so it was rough.

The last week before coming here was our best practice yet, I'd say even before the Major, because we went onto the server, found new things, and then actually tried running them and using them Russel "⁠Twistzz⁠" Van Dulken

The last week before coming here was our best practice yet, I'd say even before the Major, because we went onto the server, found new things, and then actually tried running them and using them. Not everything, there's some stuff we still need to practice, but yeah, I think we're starting to improve again and we're finding ourselves.

As you said, it was a pretty hectic period for a lot of teams making changes, including many of the teams that are here. You and Astralis are two teams that are favorite. You've both been really solid for a long time, and also you have kept your roster intact. Do you feel confident in making a trophy run here in New York?

Yeah, we can definitely win the trophy. Most of the teams made changes or are making changes. Both rosters of whatever team we play next (G2 or ENCE) made changes, eUnited made changes... so I think it'll be easy for us to make semi-finals if we just play our game against a new team. I can definitely see us in the final against Astralis.

ENCE #6 Aleksi 'allu' JalliJani 'Aerial' JussilaMiikka 'suNny' KemppiSami 'xseveN' LaasanenJere 'sergej' Salo Liquid #1 Russel 'Twistzz' Van DulkenNick 'nitr0' CannellaKeith 'NAF' MarkovicJonathan 'EliGE' JablonowskiJake 'Stewie2K' Yip eUnited #50 Ryan 'freakazoid' AbadirVictor 'food' WongEdgar 'MarKE' MaldonadoAnthony 'vanity' MalaspinaAustin 'Cooper' Abadir Russel 'Twistzz' Van Dulken Age: 19 Team: Liquid Rating 1.0: 1.14 Maps played: 900 KPR: 0.76 DPR: 0.62 G2 #13 Audric 'JACKZ' JugFabien 'kioShiMa' FieyKenny 'kennyS' SchrubFrançois 'amanek' DelaunayLucas 'Lucky' Chastang