S1mple Praises Perfecto, Talks About NAVI's Attitude at Stockholm Major 2021
An insight into NAVI's rock solid mentality.
Natus Vincere was touted as being the team with the highest chance of winning the ongoing PGL Major Stockholm 2021. Well, the CIS (Commonwealth of Independent States) squad has maintained a flawless unbeaten streak so far at the Major with four clean wins under their belt. The upcoming semifinal faceoff against Gambit Esports is probably the toughest challenge for the side on its way to the grand finals.
Talking about the team's attitude towards the Stockholm Major, Oleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev after registering a win against Vitality in the quarterfinals said that for NAVI this was "just another tournament" and that this was just their first step towards winning the long elusive coveted title.
The star AWPer also praised his teammate Ilya "Perfecto" Zalutskiy who was the overall star performer for the side, especially on the first map Dust 2, where he carried the team by winning multiple difficult rounds.
S1mple explains NAVI's mindset towards the PGL Major Stockholm 2021
NAVI has managed to reach the semifinals of the PGL Major Stockholm 2021 without dropping a single map. They registered a clean '3-0' win in the Legends Stage by defeating Heroic, Virtus.pro, NIP and followed this up by handing out a clean '2-0' sweep to Team Vitality as well.
They have achieved all this without the need of s1mple having to carry the team through these games. Instead, it has been the 18-year-old Valeriy "B1T" Vakhovskiy who has done most of the heavy lifting so far. For the first time NAVI is actually looking like a complete team and is not dependent on s1mple firing on all cylinders to fight on their behalf.
Speaking about the momentum that NAVI has built for itself and their overall approach towards the Major with regards to them performing so confidently, s1mple in a post match interview with James Banks said that,
Perhaps a lot of people say this (NAVI winning the Major), but the team is trying not to think about it. As we have said before, this is just another tournament for us, and this was our first step (towards winning the Major). Today we felt the game with our setup and finally felt the presence of the crowd, so hopefully tomorrow we will play much better.Oleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev - Interview with PGL (James Banks)
Additionally, s1mple also appreciated the effort put in by Perfecto who was the star player for the side against Team Vitality. He registered a total of 50 frags to his name while holding a K/D of +22, proving to be clutch for NAVI especially on the first map Dust 2, where the rest of the team was struggling to find its rhythm.
On the first map (Dust 2), he (Perfecto) was really insane. He saved so many rounds for us on the T-side. So yeah, everyone played great. Everyone had bit of a nerve during the start, but in the end everyone performed really good.Oleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev - Interview with PGL (James Banks)
NAVI will be facing off against their regional rivals Gambit Esports in the semifinals of the PGL Major Stockholm 2021 later today. The CIS derby is expected to go down to the wire as NAVI will be eyeing for another victory to make it through to the grand finals.
