arT: "We're putting FalleN in some spots where he can be more aggressive"

arT gave HLTV some insight into FURIA's strategic shift and the team's adaptation to FalleN calling and AWPing.

FURIA have played their first official map with in-game leader and AWPer Gabriel "⁠FalleN⁠" Toledo, as well as with fellow Imperial transfer Marcelo "⁠chelo⁠" Cespedes, at the IEM Cologne Play-In. The Brazilians beat Grayhound on Ancient, 16-11, albeit not without a small struggle in the mid-game before kicking into gear once they got their CT-side economy in check.

After the series Andrei "⁠arT⁠" Piovezan told HLTV about how the team has changed to make room for FalleN and his style of calling, as well as what parts of the team's identity have remained, and how the strategic duties are being divied up.

Date	Matches
IEM Cologne 2023 Play-in
27/07/2023	Monte 19:40 FURIA	Match

FURIA's eyes are now set on the IEM Cologne group stage, which they will reach if they can beat Monte on Thursday. "We want to avenge Imperial, that's for sure," arT said about the match against them, "so there's a little bit of blood in the water."

Big day today, it was your first official match with the new roster, and also with FalleN taking over leadership. How has that gone? How has that affected you and your role in regards to calling?

There is a lot of stuff that happened since we started bootcamping. There are some maps in which I still help a lot because we're used to playing these maps a lot and FalleN didn't play them that often. Then there are some maps that he controls a lot, so we try and help each other as much as we can with the same goal of trying to win. Whatever we are doing is focused on doing what's best for the team.

Before the game FalleN spoke a bit about how you have different approaches. You're more focused on micro, him on macro. How's the process of coming up with strategies and how the team is conforming to the meta now?

It depends on the map. Some maps we play more the way FalleN plays, and some maps we play more my way. It depends on the map and the way we approach rounds. Some strategies are more 'freestyle', if you want, and some are more Imperial style. It's not just one-sided, it's a mix between both things and we help each other to complement each others' calls and strats.

I am someone who likes to take some more space and early duels with set plays and then play the round slowly. When he wants to play the round slowly sometimes I'll just make a quick set play to pressure the enemy. We're just seeing what's happening, what's going on, what's good and what's not because it's a lot of training and less tournaments. We want to play tournaments to see what works for us.

How about having a new AWPer, it has been hard for AWPers to adapt to FURIA in the past. Has anything changed in regards to that?

I think a little bit. FalleN used to be a very aggressive AWPer back in the day and took more of a supportive role over the years. Now we're putting him in some spots where he can be more aggressive and he's been trying that during the bootcamp. He was playing very aggro during some maps because he's feeling more free to roam around. He knows we're going to complement his plays, so it depends on the map, as well.

The other new incorporation, chelo, how is that going because when he was playing in Imperial it wasn't really a one-to-one switch with drop's roles. How have you reorganized the team?

On most maps there wasn't much trouble because I could fill some spots. That wasn't a problem for me. For chelo, he's a very solid aimer and also a very helpful and supportive player, so he does whatever we want him to do and he's happy to do that — that's awesome from him. He's taking some spots he never played, so he's learning. It's a process, so of course he'll struggle a bit on some positions. We pracced so many situations in such a short period of time, so he's still adapting.

How did you feel after the bootcamp and how do you feel now that you have your first official map under the belt?

Practicing is way different than tournaments, the way opposition plays is way different, so we're still struggling with some slow rounds. I think we're trying to do too much on some of the rounds that we lost, that we just had to kill. I think it's kind of the nerves, it was the first match.

We have some weight on our shoulders. Everybody has some weight. I have some, FalleN has some, they need to perform. It's been like two months since we played an official match so the first match was a bit rough, but we'll get better.

You had a couple of scary moments, some ecos and anti-ecos not going your way, others going your way. Was it a bit too close for comfort against a team like Grayhound, that you're favorites against?

Yeah, of course. The CT side on Ancient is always a bit tricky and you need to play solid. We lost so many guns and had such a bad economy for the whole game that it felt really uncomfortable, but that eco really helped us to get some economy and momentum into the game.

You're going to be playing Monte tomorrow for a spot in the group stage. Is it a team you have any thoughts about playing against?

We want to avenge Imperial, that's for sure, so there's a little bit of blood in the water. At the same time we just want to focus on our game and play the best we can. This tournament is kind of a test for us, we really want to find some pace and see what's good for the team because there are so many things in the air right now.

Me and FalleN, we're helping each other with strats, with calling a lot of rounds, so we're still finding a middle ground to see what works best. It depends on the map, of course, but we're trying to find the best possible way to play.

After today's map what is it you learned and want to take into the next game? Something that needs some focus.

Ancient is a map that we still have a lot of FURIA things on, we approach the game with a very fast pace and some small set strats and different rotations, but we had like three rounds that we could have just reset and played it slow. I think that if we were more comfortable doing that we would have a way better T side.

For CT, it's hard to say because the ecos really messed our economy and it was very hard. It's a lot to process now, we're just going to have to watch the game and see what mistakes we made and try to fix them and just look forward to having a better map.