NAF: "If I'm not really getting my kills, I'm not doing my job"

Keith "NAF" Markovic talked with Arnie Petty right after Liquid's qualification match against Grayhound, which saw the North American side making it into the Legends stage after starting the major 0-2.

Congratulations, you have completed the reverse sweep. How do you feel after that?

It feels good to remain in the tournament, and make it to the Legends stage. It's a huge goal, last CS:GO major, we don't want to throw it away, so I'm glad we were able to bounce back, we kept our composure, we talked about our previous mistakes in the previous games and we were able to bounce back.

You really looked like a completely different team yesterday and today, compared to the rest of the days. What changed for you to so quickly flip the switch?

It has a lot to do with having our backs against the wall. Going down 0-2, I think struck a lot of fear into people's nerves. For us to go 0-3 would have been really bad, we would've felt like shit for sure for myself, my teammates, my organization. I'm super happy that we were able to bounce back. After our games, we just talked about what went wrong and no one was trying to hide anything at all, very open, we needed to be honest with ourselves and say "Hey, we are not really playing our best Counter-Strike, if we want to win the major here, we need to be better".

EliGE said the game against Fluxo was really important to settle the nerves. You think that's maybe why you couldn't close out the first couple of games?

Yeah, I mean, in the first game I played terribly. The first game I didn't show my A game, I felt bad to let my teammates down, and then in the FORZE game, I believe that we were able to comeback, I think we made the right adjustments, it was just a small margin of adjustments that made us falter in the end. Overall, everyone is happy to still remain in the tournament and go into the Legends stage. We just got to see what happens there.

In that first game, you are such a consistent player usually, was there anything in particular about that game or was it just an off game?

I just felt like it was an off game. It's very unfortunate to start out the major and just see myself 0/13 on the scoreboard. There were mistakes that I made, but I think as a team we were uncomfortable at times and I think that threw some players off, especially myself. Individually, I didn't find my form that game and I let my teammates down. Usually, when I perform badly I am really hard on myself, I take a good look in the mirror and understand that I need to do better or else you are not bringing much to the table. I just need to do better and that's always how I think. I think I have a strong mindset when it comes to those things, and I feel like that's a big reason why I'm consistent.

Do you think it's because of that mindset that you are now Liquid's highest-rated player of the event?

I don't know. That's always good to hear. All the other players they bring a lot to the table, in terms of strategies and understanding what they want to do. I just played this boss that I need to play, and I just need to get my kills. If I'm not really getting my kills, I'm not doing my job. I take it really hard on myself. You got to be honest to yourself if you want to be the best, and fix your problems, you can't just be delusional about them or just swipe them under the rug. I'm always going to be honest, always going to do my job, and make sure that I'm doing them to the best of my abilities.

This match looked fairly comfortable, you were always in control. Does this give you confidence moving forward into the Legends stage?

Of course. We started out 0-2 and for us to comeback, we did beat a decent South American team in terms of Fluxo and we had to beat our fellow North Americans Complexity, and then we beat an Oceanic team. It's not like we came back and beat the greatest of teams but at the same time we got to say we won the matches that we needed to win, we faltered and we started slow. We just needed to comeback and show what we showed here and bring it to the next stage, and just be more confident, be more ready, more prepared. Versus those top European teams it's not going to be so easy, we just need to make sure that we are on our A game when we show up in the next stage.

You didn't have to beat a European team here. Is there any kind of worry about the step up in competition as you head to the Legends stage?

Obviously, yeah. Do we necessarily deserve to be in the Legends? I mean we did play the games and beat the opponents we needed to beat to be here but if you look at the teams on paper, maybe we don't deserve to be here. Ultimately, we kind of gave ourselves a second life, so we need to make sure we go into the Legends stage playing against these top teams and we really show our A game, or else it's not going to look too good for us.

As you said, having your backs against the wall raised your form. Now you are moving up against stronger competition, is that also going to be able to raise your form?

I think with our team, a lot of times we are playing teams that we feel are lower level to us, and their playstyles are different because we don't really play against them too much. We don't really understand at the moment how to correct ourselves and make the right plays, and to adapt to what's going on. When it comes to the top European teams, I feel like we have a better understanding and we also just have a similar style and that's a style that we've all played for years because a lot of our players have been on the top playing against these European teams for years. I think we are a bit more comfortable playing those teams, I believe we are in some sense, because these younger teams, teams we don't know too much about, they can kind of surprise you and catch you off guard with something you might not expect, so playing on the tier one scene you expect more things, we know more things, we just got to make sure that our fundamentals and teamwork are just better than theirs, we just have better mind games and in the end we just need to step up and make sure that we can compete versus these top teams.

What's the team's goal now that you made it into Legends?

Last CS:GO major, we want to at least go out making playoffs. Last time I made playoffs, I believe, was in 2019. It's been a long time, hopefully, we can return to form and make playoffs and cement Liquid in the right place that they are supposed to be.

After today's win, Liquid qualified for the Legends stage, where they will meet 9INE to open the last phase before the playoffs. Back on BO1s, NAF and Liquid hope to have a better start to the Legends compared to the Challengers stage.