Imperial made waves at BLAST Premier Spring Final as they made the semi finals in Washington D.C.
With multiple changes since then, Imperial are looking to make the first steps towards repeating that as they are set to kick off their BLAST Premier Fall Showdown campaign.
Key to their hopes of doing so is VINI, the man who stepped in to fill the boots of legendary captain FalleN after the AWPer left for FURIA. Before Showdown, we spoke to VINI about his transition to IGL, what he learned from his former captain, and his hopes of competing at BLAST Premier Fall Final.
You’ve recently taken over as IGL of the team. How is that going?
It has been an enjoyable process. There’s a lot of new stuff that I'm learning day by day and I'm finding new ways in how to look at the game. Nowadays it's more about understanding more of my role and how I can make each of my players play better in our own system. In-game it's more about refining our basics and waiting for CS2 to launch, and then grinding the new game to understand how to use the new mechanics.
How much did you learn from FalleN in terms of IGLing?
I’m trying to focus on the positive things he had as a leader that would help everyone play better in the server. We still use some of his fundamentals and a few strats that stayed in our playbook with his departure.
You were recently invited to BLAST Fall Showdown. What would it mean to you and the team to qualify for Fall Final?
It would be the necessary lift that we are needing right now after some bad results, we are still a new team but with some good, experienced players, it's more about everyone believing in how good we are and can be and translate all of that to our game.
The team had a great run at Spring Final, finishing in the top four; what was that experience like?
It had been a long time since I had played in a real match in playoff and it was sensational. The emotions were high and that made me remember why I love to play this game so much. We definitely want to feel like that again.
If you qualify from Fall Showdown, do you think you can go far again?
It’s too soon to tell, but if we win this Showdown again we would be really confident and motivated to do the most damage we can against the big dogs at the event.
BLAST Premier Fall Showdown is set to kick off on October 4th. One team from Europe and one team from the Americas will earn their spot at BLAST Premier Fall Final at the event.
Imperial kick off their tournament against TheMongolz in the very first game of the Americas Showdown, you can watch all the action right here on BLAST.tv
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