We had a chance to sit down with Rigon ‘rigoN’ Gashi and have a talk to him about how this RMR have been going for BNE and ask some more questions.
Hugo “TheSwedishJoker” Nilsson Meier, BLIX.GG: BNE have made the Major once again. Can you just talk me through the whole series and how it was from your perspective?
Rigon ‘rigoN’ Gashi: We knew that FaZe are lacking right now a bit, they’re not playing at their best, and we just kept believing. We came into the match in a good mood, just tried to make a good mood, and we took the game as practice. We said ‘Guys, it doesn’t matter who’s behind FaZe, we just play like in practice and we just give our best’, and that paid off in the end!
Q: Obviously you guys played against them last time, you knocked them out from the Rio Major. Does it feel a bit like a déjà -vu? Do you think you are their kryptonite now?
rigoN: No, I don’t think we’re their kryptonite, but we’ve been here three times. It’s the third time we’ve been here, and we have gained some experience in how to close matches and stuff like this, not to be too overhyped, stay calm and play the rounds. I think this is a good thing that it’s the third time we’ve been here.
Q: As you said it’s your third time making it to the Major, and you guys still don’t have an organization. Have you had any talks, or do you think something will happen now?
rigoN: We’ve had some talks to be honest, but I don’t know because Banks (James Banks, ed.) is always doing the negotiations and the stuff with the organizations. I think in the end it just didn’t work out, not that we want 20k per player or something, I don’t know what happened there, to be honest. We don’t want much, but as I’ve said before, if an organization wants to take us it would be nice, yeah.
Q: The North-American organization TSM, for example, announced they would be getting back into CS:GO. Do you have any preference for organizations, or is it just whoever will help you stay in Europe?
rigoN: I think it’s just whoever will help us, inside the game and outside the game, give us boot camps and stuff like this. We don’t want high salaries, whatever, I hear always ‘They want so much salary, and bla bla bla’ but it’s not true, it’s completely not true. We will see, of course, we’ll get offers and we will see.
Q: You guys are the first Balkan team to make it to a Major, now for a third time. Does it feel like you’re building the Balkan scene? What do you think it’s needed for us to see more Balkan teams or individual players?
rigoN: I can’t really answer this question, because we have been building now for two years. We took progress, progress, progress, it doesn’t work like today to tomorrow ‘Oh, we’re in the Major’, you know? We took a gamble in the first Major we qualified because we were individually good, we took a gamble, we won. In the second Major, we had made even more steps forward, and now I think on the third step, the third time we qualify, I think we are going to definitely keep a high level. But I don’t really have a’¦ because I’m Swiss and in Switzerland, there are no CS players either!
Q: You’re Swiss, were your parents Albanian? Do you speak Albanian with them? How does it work for you?
rigoN: My parents are from Albania, Kosovo, and they came before the war already in Switzerland. I was born in western Switzerland, so I know Albanian, German and whatever.
Q: Do you prefer speaking Albanian, or do you prefer Swiss German?
rigoN: I don’t care, I speak them all together!
Q: When you guys came into the scene everyone was thinking you were just another FPL team, how do you feel like you guys have evolved since that first Major? Do you feel more like a structured team compared to then?
rigoN: We have structure, but we still do our plays, because our plays brought us to this point. What we have now is more discipline, how to close out games and stuff like this, that’s all.
Q: I’ve seen how emotional and loud you guys are, does it sometimes get too much and you have to turn it down? How do you guys sort it out in the team?
rigoN: I mean, versus FaZe right now we were 15-14 and shouting like this, we just tried to calm down because you cannot put down the adrenaline, it’s going to stay. But we just tried to calm down, take a breather and go on!
Q: Since the last Major your results have been mixed, and I think that it was the same after the first one. Why do you think that is, is it due to online CS?
rigoN: I think it’s online CS, because if you see like’¦ I don’t want to be rude or something, I like the SAW guys, but for example, SAW destroyed us 2-0 online and they just melted us. Then they come for example here and they have had tough matches, but it’s just the online CS. We’re kinda bored of playing online, you know? We want to start playing the tier-one tournaments, in two weeks now we go to Melbourne and we hope to win the whole event so we can finally qualify for Pro League. Then the fun starts for us.
Q: What are your plans now, after here? You guys are going to play tomorrow, but after that have you guys talked about what you’re going to do?
rigoN: We’ll probably have like 2-3 off days because we went to boot camp as well, we’re on the road for three weeks now. Afterwards, we are going to Melbourne and have the tournament, where we will try to win it!
Q: CS2 has come out, have you been able to play the beta yet or have you just been focusing on CS:GO prior to the Major?
rigoN: I played CS2 on the first day when it came out, I got the beta as well. I played one game but it’s actually the same game, it’s just the Molotovs and the sprays are a bit different. After this I didn’t play anymore, only CS:GO so we could focus on the Major.
Q: Nikola ‘Lobanjica’ MijomanoviÄ has been very vocal and critical on Twitter, do you agree with the things he has been saying about the game?
rigoN: To be honest I read it but I don’t care, it’s his opinion and he can do whatever he wants. My opinion is that it’s the same game, it’s nothing special.
Q: Is there anything you’d want to see changed before it gets released to the public and you start playing tournaments on it?
rigoN: Not really, as I said, I don’t care! I would like to play CS:GO but CS2 is out and we’ll just take it how it is.
