Gorilla: "Trace aren't underdogs at all here"

Note: This article is a text port of our live interview with Gorilla. The video interview can be found here.

Off the back of a 1-2 defeat to China's Trace Esports Trace Esports China Rank #3 LuoK1ng Zhang Zhanpeng (张展鹏) Kai Lu Zhinan (卢智楠) FengF Song Xuefeng (宋学锋) heybay Ho Shun Hei Biank Zhong Jianfei (钟剑飞) Zhao in the second match of Group C, VLR.gg had the opportunity to speak to Team Vitality Team Vitality Europe Rank #9 trexx Nikita Cherednichenko Derke Nikita Sirmitev Kicks Kimmie Laasner Sayf Saif Jibraeel Less Felipe de Loyola Basso 's Harry "Gorilla" Mepham regarding the defeat. For Vitality, even with a loss, today's match stands as a great learning experience for their future Champions matches.

Champions is the first international event for Kicks and runneR. Additionally, trexx and ceNder, haven't been to an event ever since LOCK//IN. How did it feel for the team to play on the stage today for Vitality's Champions debut? Do you feel as though nerves were noticeable at all amongst the players?

"I think in the first map, it was definitely down to a lot of nerves. I'd say before we've never been a strong first map team, but I think that the nerves definitely did take over a bit in terms of how we were communicating. I think it was good to get it out the way and have a good mental reset after map one, which happened, but I think nerves played a part today."

Ascent came as a strong map for both you and Trace. Coming into the map, what were some of the preparations in place for the way Trace plays Ascent?

"Mainly we were putting a heavy focus on Kai. He has a history to just walk up and contact in and buy the Operator on attack and defense. We noticed that he was definitely a win condition for them, so we put heavy prep into trying to play positions where we would minimize his value. It was mainly on focusing on where he plays and their main reactions to our stuff."

A similar theme to the beginning of Ascent continued heading into your attacking half, where Trace found themselves taking many of the opening rounds, eventually finding their way up 11-6. However, you managed to help take what seemed like finished business for Trace into overtime. How did Vitality rally back from being down at a five-round deficit from round 18 onwards?

"It's the good old saying, when when you think it's over, it's never over against us. NaVi learned that the hard way. Heretics did as well when they were on Icebox when we were down 3-11 down. BBL learned it as well pretty quickly, so when you think that you have us down and out, you can never you can never count us count us out of coming back. We're very good at that."

Vitality unfortunately ended up losing in overtime. Despite the loss, what were some of the main errors encountered on Ascent that you looked to fix before going into Sunset?

"Sunset is a very comfortable map for us, we're very good at it. So I think it was just a 'Okay guys, that's fine, they they played incredibly well on Ascent.' Honestly, I said it in the press conference, Trace has some of the best Ascent attack macro that I've seen. Resetting for Sunset, we know it's a weaker map for them, it's a stronger map for us, it should be fairly straightforward, and it was."

Sunset looked firmly in your hands, as shown with a dominant end to the map 13-7. Do you feel as though the series could've swayed greatly in your favor as map two ended with a much more confident look for Vitality in comparison to Ascent?

"Oh yeah, one hundred percent. For map three, it kind of was as well. It was a 5-1 start at first."

Trace entered Bind with a double Sentinel comp, choosing to play Deadlock over an agent like Viper. Initially, upon a first glance, do you think the change helped or hurt your chances at taking Bind?

"I think for the most part it did. It made their attack very strong, we used to run the Deadlock quite a lot on Bind, so we kind of knew what they could do with it and how they were going to. But I think it's just down to us pace-changing on attack when we didn't need to. We knew that against Deadlock, you play slow, default to break the traps, and then we really just didn't have an answer for them executing on us on defense. I think for the most part, if they catch us on a different day, we definitely take that map. Not having a Viper on Bind hurts teams a lot more than teams that have it."

The first half of Bind ended dead even at 6-6. From being up 6-1 to tying at the half, what did you discuss before heading into defense?

"We discussed some of the prep because we hard prepped them. Bind was a map that we were initially going to pick, but we weren't entirely sold on if they'd run the same comp because they've changed agents every every time they played Bind. We decided to leave it for third map, so we discussed the prep and what they can do on their attack, the weaknesses of running the Deadlock and Cypher compared to more traditional comps; we were just basically not trying to predict what they'll do but put ourselves in positions to capitalize on their attack macro."

You managed to take the second pistol, however your subsequent anti-eco resulted in a thrifty that led to Trace's momentum seemingly spiraling out of control. What mistakes caused things to start going wrong after round 13?

"I think we took a lot of solo fights against them. The only thing they have to initiate is the Skye dog. The flashes don't really do anything on Skye, so the only thing to really have impact on is the Skye dog. Against that, they just followed behind it; we basically just gave them too much. Viper would die in Lamps or we would give up Lamps and give them it for free, or someone would die in Hookah alone. I think we didn't adapt well enough on defense in terms of putting ourselves in positions to be anti-exec every round. We kind of just expected them to play a slower, more thought out round like they had done on the previous two maps.

Do you think the aforementioned nerve issues made this problem worse?

"Yeah. I think it definitely plays in. I think every game, people are nervous. It's a competition, right? They're not underdogs at all here, I don't think anyone should be considered underdogs at Champions, but there people are predicting them to lose."

Was there a moment where you realized that Trace's momentum seemed unstoppable?

"It was after the anti-eco. They've basically just been playing fast rounds, and then after the anti-eco, it's every map. If you lose the anti-eco after winning pistol, your your economy is awful while the other team's economy is amazing from that. Then by the time you get a buy, they get ultimates because they plan it out, and it just spirals out from there. It's really hard to come back from it."

How do you view today's loss and what are some of your main takeaways from the series as a whole?

"I think it was a really good experience for everyone, myself included, like where I can improve on my timeouts. It was some well-needed experience. You need to get whooped every once in a while, and we had it here on that last map. But you know, I think even though we lost the series, we showed some really good rounds. We showed some really good team play together, but we just have to be better next time."

To close off, with your loss today, you're set to go against Talon Esports in the coming days. Do you have any initial thoughts on the matchup?

"They play a style that again, we're not too used to. It's going to be a challenge for us, and we need to prepare well."