Though Team BDS ended their group stage on a disappointing note, falling to Team Heretics, the Swiss organization is now turning its attention to the playoffs of the 2025 League of Legends EMEA Championship (LEC) summer season. Having struggled to meet expectations, the squad has endured a challenging split and is now looking for redemption. In an exclusive interview, the team’s young support, Polat "Parus" Furkan Çiçek, sits down with Sheep Esports to discuss his adaptation to the LEC, his team’s difficulties, and the overall level of competition in the league.

What happened against Heretics? What could have been done better?

Polat "Parus" Furkan Çiçek: “During the first game, we played the laning phase quite poorly with Ice (Yoon Sang-hoon). I made the most mistakes. Today, in general, I’m not happy with my performance, I played really badly. We gave so much early in the first game. Second game, we played decently. But our macro is not really fast right now. We are losing a lot of games because we are not fast. But for today especially, it’s on me.

BDS had high expectations before this split, but now you’re 1-3, barely qualified for playoffs. What has happened since the start of the split that led to this score?

Parus: In-game, we don’t feel like we are playing as five right now. We are often making two separate decisions at once. We don’t help each other at some points. We leave Rooster (Shin Yun-hwan) alone a lot. Sometimes we leave Ice alone too and randomly die, like I did today. Usually being slow and not helping each other are our biggest problems right now. Coordination and communication are our problem. We will focus on that in the upcoming weeks.

You have a week before playoffs, but starting from the lower bracket means no room for error. What needs to happen to fix these issues?

Parus: Maybe we can play more blitz-scrims to improve on our early game because we made a lot of mistakes early. We need to talk a lot about our problems. Everyone needs to say what they think is wrong, what they can improve. For me, today I saw a lot of things I can improve. Just be honest about what you expect from your teammates. We just need to practice more.

How has the atmosphere been in BDS? Is there a lot of pressure on you to perform, considering the team is aiming for Worlds?

Parus: There is pressure that we put on ourselves because the first two splits were not good; we had bad results. We just want to show what we can really do. Sadly this split hasn’t started much better. I hope we can fix our problems and show a better BDS in the playoffs.

What do you think about the level of middle-of-the-pack teams in the LEC? Many people say there’s a big gap between the top four (MKOI, KC, G2, FNC) and the rest (VIT, GX, TH, BDS). Do you agree?

Parus: To be honest, I disagree with that take. Lately in scrims, we played almost every team in LEC. Top teams are not performing that well. They are making mistakes as well. I don’t think there is a big gap between middle-of-the-pack and top teams. But there are still a lot of things to improve for us.

Do you think there’s a gap between how teams perform in scrims versus on stage?

Parus: On stage, you always play worse. I don’t think any team plays better on stage because in scrims you just play less stressed and feel more confident about what you can do. On stage it doesn’t work like that. There are a few teams that are heavily underperforming on stage: GIANTX is one of them for sure. In scrims they are really good, but on stage they really haven’t shown it.

Why do you think not all ex-BDS Academy players found the same success in the LEC as they did in ERLs? Besides Rudy "SkewMond" Semaan and yourself, your past teammates could not replicate the success you had in ERLs.

Parus: We were good as a group. Everyone understood each other—how we wanted to play. Our communication was good. Not being able to show your individual level in the LEC also depends on the roster or if you can fit in the roster. In my case, I still don’t think I’ve shown great performances in the LEC, and it’s my fault. I wouldn’t say it’s because of my team. But SkewMond has a good roster, he has G2. It would be almost hard for him to perform poorly. The boys who went to SK had a much harder task.

What result do you think you need in playoffs to be able to call this year a success?

Parus: Worlds, obviously. Going to Worlds. If we do less than Worlds, it will not be successful. Even if we go to Worlds, I don’t want to go there as 3rd place. I hope we can do 1st or 2nd. We will work for it.

Reflecting on almost a full year in the LEC, how do you view your growth and adaptation as an individual player?

Parus: So far, I didn’t do a great job at adapting to the LEC. I feel like I’m playing very poorly in some of the games, especially today. We could have won if I played better. I think I’ve grown, but not enough and not a lot. I’m not so happy with my performance so far, but I will try my best to do better.

Do you feel it’s harder to be flashy as a support in the LEC compared to the ERLs, given the more standardized macro play?

Parus: Yeah, for sure. In the ERL, if you have a great team like I did, you can do whatever you want and most of it will look good because your team is winning. But in the LEC, you play slower, people play smarter. It’s not as easy to shine as in the ERL.”