Fresh off second place finishes at ESWC Sweden and Dreamhack respectivly, Fnatic is well prepared and highly motivated to make a stand at ESWC 2006. Despite their success, Fnatic has yet to overcome their Swedish counterparts in NiP and has yet to play on a stage as big as ESWC. Can Fnatic overcome the odds and critics and make a stand in this years ESWC Finals? Fnatic's Harley "dsn" Örwall answers this and more in this interview.


Fnatic's ESWC Roster

Harley "dsn" Örwall
Patrik "cArn" Sättermon
Kristoffer "Tentpole" Nordlund
Patrik "f0rest" Lindberg
Oscar "Archi" Torgersen

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First of all, congratulations qualifying for your first ESWC as a team.

Thanks a lot.

In the offseason between CPL Winter and the two largest summer events, ESWC and CPL Summer, the Fnatic organization made some drastic changes to its Counterstrike team, leaving only you and replacing the other 4 players (Magix, Megaton, diGital, and zaffe). Why the sudden change? After all, you were defeated by two of the best teams in the field at CPLWinter, 3D and NiP?

I felt that the old fnatic was an ok team, but nothing more than that. I don´t think that we would´ve made it to the absolute top in the world. We did good at practice but lacked a lot of experience in the big games, which eventually lost some matches for us (losing a glock-eco on cbble vs 3D as CT etc). I had a lot of fun with the old team, but when the fnatic management asked me about the future I would´ve lied if I had said that I thought that we would make it to the absolute top, hence the roster change in the beginning of 2006.

You have played with current teammate, cArn, on a few teams before Fnatic. Was it nice to see a familiar face coming into the new lineup after the disappointing CPL winter 2005 performance?

Yes, it really was. I´ve played with Patrik for a long time, and we´ve been to every event I´ve ever been to abroad (except two or three) together. I really know where I have Patrik and I really respect his game and how he thinks in situations. Patrik is a player I´ve studied a lot and I´ve learned tons of things just by playing and discussing strategy with him.

Had you ever played with or against any of the other additions (archi, tentpole, f0rest)? If, so what did you think of them?

No, f0rest, tentpole and archi were all new faces to me, meaning I never played with them in a clan before. But I obviously knew how good they were, since I was the one building the team.

Were you happy with the lineup the Fnatic organization chose at the time of announcement and are you content with the development of the new team?

Yes, I´m very happy that they trusted me in building a new team for them, and I´m very happy about our results so far. Except the pre-qualifier for the Swedish ESWC-finals, where we lost to NiP with 14-16, we´ve never ended up outside top2 on LAN. I´m really happy with how consistent we´ve been on LAN. ESWC is probably our first real big test though, and it´s a lot of good teams here.

Which new player has made the most impact, either in-game or out of game?

It´s hard to say, obviously f0rest is a superstar and he deserves all the respect that he gets. Even when f0rest isn´t playing his A-game, some other player usually step up, so it´s a pretty good balance in the team.

With your current Fnatic lineup, you recently competed at the WSVG Dreamhack event and the ESWC Sweden Qualifiers, defeating such great European teams as SK.swe, x6.swe (3 times), and Lehnitz.Speedlink. Unfortunately, you had a record of 0-3 against the winner of both events, NiP. Was your team content with how you played?

We had a break before the event, and I really think that NiP and fnatic knows each others game pretty much in detail. I think that NiP had time to capitalize on the fact that they knew our game, while we came unprepared in all ways. NiP was the better team, there´s really not so much more to it.

What factors contributed to the back to back to back losses and what is Fnatic's plan to remedy the problem(s) in the upcoming tournaments?

I mean, NiP was really strong and I think they outplayed us. The positive thing about it is that I think that NiP will think that there game is almost flawless, while all the other teams will be able to adjust. I think that the teams being hyped is also the teams being most analyzed. Before the event, I think people thought of us as a really strong opponent. At ESWC, many clans will see NiP as the biggest threat and their game will be analyzed a lot and their weak points will really be tested. I hope that they do good though, I wouldn´t mind a fnatic/NiP top2 :).

What was it like playing against your former teammate, Magix, and defeating his new team Lehnitz.Speedlink?

I think he was just a standin and I didn´t really feel anything special
about the game. Magix is a great guy and we´re not enemies or something like that, so it wasn´t really anything special about the game just because I played versus Magix.

The two biggest events of the year are quickly approaching. Which event are you and your team looking forward to more, ESWC or CPL? Which event do you think your team will have the most success at?

I can´t really say, both events feature a lot of great teams. I hope that we do good at ESWC though, due to the fact that it´s more money there.

Which event do you think means more to your team?

ESWC, just becuase it´s more money and none of us has been here before.

The last CPL event played host to probably the most competitive field in the history of eSports and this CPL looks like it will be no different. How do you plan to make it all the way through the field and finish at the top?

Just playing our A-game and don´t fear any team. I think that we have a really skilled individual team and we´ve got our strats working pretty good lately. But as always, one map in CS is random in my opinion, so it can go either way if we´re unlucky.

What do you think about the WSVG in the long run? Will it be a success? Can it draw mainstream audiences worldwide that were previously uninterested?

Hopefully, but I honestly don´t know. I think it´s a great concept running tournaments around the world, it´s really fun for the players to visit different places than Dallas twice a year for the CPL, and hopefully it will attract local crowd as well as media. Media is obviously the best way for eSports to be recognized by the mainstream. When the media really starts to focus more on eSports, if they ever do, I think that we´ll see a lot of great competitions with more money. Poker made it, and I think that e-sport is a lot more fun to watch.

Thanks for taking the time out of your already busy day. Any final words?

Thanks to our sponsors Intel, Everglide, Razer, Sennheiser and Nvidia. Also, a big thanks to our café HLO (www.hlo.nu) in Stockholm and all the people behind Fnatic for being so awesome.