GODSENT rifler: We want to break into Top 10

We have sat down with GODSENT’s experienced rifler Jesse “zehN” Linjala, in an interview, where the Finnish player opens up about GODSENT’s ambitions and goals, their impressive run in DreamHack Masters Winter, and also the difference between Kevin “kRYSTAL” Amend and Luka “emi” Vukovic’s leadership style.

GODSENT surprised everyone at DreamHack Masters Winter by putting up an impressive run, even though, coming into the event as the fifth lowest-ranked team out of the 16 attending teams. The underdogs were quickly dubbed as ‘The Danish Destroyer’ after taking down the top trio of Astralis, Heroic and North in strong fashion. 

The 29-year old Finn breaks down their DH Masters Winter campaign by explaining how being huge underdogs and playing with a stand-in IGL helped them to loosen up and establish a mindset where they had nothing to lose.

“When we faced Astralis we knew, that we had nothing to lose being heavy underdogs. However, it’s really easy for us to play as an underdog, because we have no pressure and then basically you can do even the stupidest play and still win a round and get momentum. This is what happened against Astralis, and then we beat North, and then we beat Heroic same way.”

The former HAVU player is confident that the CS:GO world haven’t seen the peak of GODSENT when being asked whether this GODSENT roster can advance and develop into a potential top tier team. The experienced rifler further states that they are looking for a new fifth to improve their chances. 

“Yeah, definitely. We have been talking for the last 6 months, that the next goal for us, is to break into Top 15 and then Top 10. We have defeated Heroic twice in a row, we beat an Astralis team that we never have won a map against, we beat mousesports, G2, fnatic, NiP. The keys for us will be to find to find consistency to actually do this more often. It means, that we have to play more together and have a stable fifth who can also hardcore frag or even carry in some maps if needed.”

I think it’s fair to say that we at moment, are trying out a new fifth for emi. We have agreed that now when we have no more games for the rest of the year, that we want to start off 2021 with a new fresh fifth. The season ends soon and people will bench players and players will be bought out and this is when we strike, so to speak. We are waiting a bit and then we try out a few other options, to see who’s the best fit for us. 

Massive clutch by zehN against mousesports.

zehN breaks down the signing of emi as a stand-in and explains the difference between him and their former IGL Kevin “kRYSTAL” Amend. 

We had problems signing or buying anyone out of their contract because the season still is ongoing and we needed to have a player within two weeks for DreamHack Masters Winter and BLAST. We had to just take someone who was a free agent and not tied to any organizations, and that’s why we took emi for a few events. emi, didn’t necessarily change a lot, the only thing he did bring, was his own view. We put him on the same spots as kRYSTAL, and emi just adapted and did his own style basically. 

“He’s a different type of leader. He didn’t bring any special, that we haven’t seen before. He’s more strict when it comes to plays and he usually wants to go with his own vision and usually has the last word regarding strategy and ideas. We tried to tell him when a player plays a spot, he gathers a lot of information and where you sometimes can abuse this information doing a game. The difference between them may be that Kevin (kRYSTAL) listen more on what his players are telling him, where emi rather wants to go with the view he has.”

We asked him which leader style he believes, suits the team the best.

“I think it’s kind of 50-50. Sometimes it’s nice that there’s only one way, but how we have seen this year and where we play the best, is when there is a flow and everyone is listening to each other. Usually, we base our calls on some kind of information or common knowledge of the game. If there is someone having an idea, you just go with it. We have realised this is the best way for us to play since we have beaten really big names.