FNC Oscarinin: “My goal is to make it out of Swiss — I think it’s pretty doable honestly.”

Q: How are we feeling? How’s the trip to China so far?

Oscarinin: Pretty good, besides the first few days with the jet lag being pretty annoying because you’re mega tired, but besides that, pretty good. I like it a lot, honestly.

Q: The other problem that happens is that at the same time as jet lag, western teams just kind of get fisted in scrims. Has that also been happening?

Oscarinin: I mean, not really. [We haven’t] scrimmed a lot of Asian teams, but I don’t think we’re getting fisted. I think it’s been fine for now, so I’m pretty happy with that at least.

Q: Have you been keeping up with where people are ranking you strength-wise? Leading up to Swiss, how are you feeling about your strength as a team right now?

Oscarinin: Obviously I know we are not favorites or anything like that, but I think we can for sure compete against Asian teams. I think we can have some good showings. My goal is to make it out of Swiss — I think it’s pretty doable honestly.

I think we are performing decently and improving with scrims. It’s always nice to scrim at Worlds or MSI or any international because you can actually see where you need to improve. We’re taking feedback nicely, and yeah, I think we can do some good damage.

Q: Do you feel you improved throughout the year, or just that the team got better at playing around you?

Oscarinin: I think by the end of the year we were playing way better with me. We had many talks about how to play with top lane, how I want to play the game, how I see the game, and I think we improved a lot on that after some time.

In summer playoffs, we were already playing way better with me. I was way more confident and really in the zone. I prepared myself a lot mentally for that game because it was very important for us — we were fighting for Worlds. So yeah, I think that’s mostly what changed for me: just feeling more comfortable in the team and being really locked in.

Q: Have you guys gotten to go out and explore Beijing as a team?

Oscarinin: No, not really. We didn’t really visit Beijing. Honestly, we just went out for some dinner.

Q: If you were to get a jersey swap or a photo with any of the players at Worlds from another region, who would you want to meet or get a jersey swap with?

Oscarinin: I would say the first would be TheShy for sure. I’ve been a huge fan of TheShy since always, like since 2018. I think he’s super good and he’s been very consistent over the years. It’s hard to be as good as he’s been for this long, even though obviously he’s not always consistent, I think he’s always been one of the best.

Q: If you had to pick five players from other regions to defend you — you get prep time and the other 80 players are coming to attack — who are you picking?

Oscarinin: Okay, I’m picking Bin. Yeah, he’s kinda scary. Holy fuck, I have to choose four more? Maybe I’ll choose Busio — I saw Twitter pictures and he looks pretty jacked, so he’s a good pick.

Then I would say Upset. He’s pretty tall and strong, so he could defend me nicely. Plus, he’s my ADC, so obviously he’s gonna defend me.

And last two? Who else is strong? Holy, this is hard. I will not pick Poby, that’s for sure. He’s too skinny.

Zeka is a pretty good choice too. I like Zeka. He’s a very good player. He’s handsome. He has everything. And for the last one, I’ll just go with Guma, I guess. I’ll pick those five. I think they can probably 5v80. Yeah, they’re strong — those are a strong set.

Q: Since you’ve been on the team for quite a while, how much do you think success factors into team culture and liking each other?

Oscarinin: I think in teams you need to at least trust each other to actually be good. When things go smoothly outside of the game, you can talk to each other after games like, “Oh, you were throwing here,” or “You should’ve done this,” and you have more confidence with that person to tell them their mistakes without them getting emotional or mad.

It’s easier to play in-game too because you trust that person. It’s also important that you’re having fun outside of the game with each other and can just talk about anything, because you’re spending almost a full year with them. If you don’t like them, you’re completely cooked.

Q: Who do you want to face most — which team do you want your first Swiss draw to be?

Oscarinin: I want to face HLE. I want to play against Zeka. I think he’s really insane and I’ve been looking up to him for a long time now, like probably most people. I’d also like to play T1 — they’re always nice to face, a nice team. Yeah, I think it’s fun.

Transcript edits by @sakaruii