spectrum 2 case2025-04-20 22:24:17656

CeRq: "I think that the two first tournaments I'll just take as experience"

We spoke to Tsvetelin "CeRq" Dimitrov after his team beat B.O.O.T-d[S], continuing their IEM Sydney 2018 run.

The Bulgarian, who joined NRG in the summer of last year, has been putting in stellar performances as the team's AWPer, playing a pivotal role to their recent online success.

CeRq had to work on his English a lot after joining NRG

Since adding Ethan "⁠Ethan⁠" Arnold to the roster, NRG went on to qualify for a number of international tournaments, with IEM Sydney 2018 being the first one they are set to attend. Tsvetelin "⁠CeRq⁠" Dimitrov and co. opened the tournament with a 19-17 loss to Astralis, before taking out the Singaporean team to stay alive and fight for the playoffs tomorrow.

You came into this team last year, can you tell me about the first impressions you had, going to a new continent and playing for a new team? Was it hard adapting?
In the start, I had no idea how to talk to my teammates properly, we had to fix our mistakes, I had to learn more words in English... We were pretty bad at the start, our communication was bad, I wasn't talking at all. Then when I was back in Europe I was playing FPL-C and more stuff, I learned new words and with some time, it worked out. But we really weren't great at the start.
It picked up a lot when nahtE joined the team recently. Comparing that team and the team you had before, did you notice some big difference, something that he brought or something that changed when he came into the team?
I just think that in the old team, our roles weren't perfect, AnJ was a good player but I don't think we matched together. Right now we have the best roles we've ever had.
AnJ was in a support role, something that didn't click I guess, what roles changed with nahtE coming in?
Now, nahtE is just entry fragging, and we have daps and FugLy supporting me, Brehze and nahtE.
You've been on a pretty good run online so obviously, people start talking a bit more about you. How has playing online and winning all these qualifiers been for you personally?
For me, I still get nervous, even online. I don't really care, people are calling us onliners, we have jokes in the team just calling each other onliners. Even at this LAN, when we are down we just call ourselves onliners and say that we shouldn't have any pressure, that keeps the spirits up.
You qualified for this and a couple of other events, do you have a certain goal in mind, something you wish to accomplish as a team here?
Everyone in the team just wants to win as much as we can, but I think that the two first tournaments I'll just take as experience because I don't really have that much experience, I'm pretty nervous still. I think we can go far, it just depends if we have a good day or a bad day.
Regarding you living in NA, are you in a team house, how does that work for you guys?
Yeah, I'm living in a team house. I'm surrounded by my teammates, otherwise, I'd be so lonely.
There has been some speculation about Cloud9 approaching you, can you comment on that?
No one approached me pretty much, I don't know. They followed me on Twitter and everyone just thought that they were approaching me, I don't know what happened.
You played against Astralis here in the first match, it was overtime but you couldn't close it out in the end. How did that game feel from your perspective?
For me, they are the best team right now. They just came off winning Marseille, so I didn't expect too much from that game. We played on their best map, and it's our best map as well, we just wanted to see where we are, if our best map is just good as the number one team's best map. It was pretty good, we should've won the map because we won both pistols so we had a six-round advantage, but... we choked. (laughs)
Moving on in the tournament, how do you feel, what do you see yourself doing here?
Right now, I just hope we make it out of groups, that's the only thing I'm hoping for. We have tough matches coming up, G2 or fnatic, and if we beat one of them, we have to play Astralis or mousesports—the best teams in the world pretty much. I don't know, I just hope we can make it out.