In a heartbreaker for
Fnatic and its fans, the orange and black squad has been eliminated from
League of Legends EMEA Championship (LEC) 2025 Spring Playoffs contention after a 0-3 loss to Karmine Corp, finishing the split in fourth place. In an exclusive interview, the team’s toplaner,
Óscar "Oscarinin" Muñoz, sat down with Sheep Esports to discuss the reasons behind the gut-wrenching defeat, the practice leading up to the match, and what Fnatic will need to change to avoid a repeat in Summer.
Fnatic had a strong regular season but fell short in playoffs. What do you think caused the team to fall apart? How are you feeling now?
Óscar "Oscarinin" Muñoz: "I'm feeling a huge disappointment, for sure. I don't think we should only be aiming to be a top-four team—there are no doubts there. How did we end up here though? I don't know. We spotted our problems not too long ago, so we didn't have enough time to actually work on them. We were not working properly before that, or not seeing our weaknesses.
When you say the team wasn't working properly, what do you mean specifically? Do you think certain parts of practice were neglected? Was there any complacency after finishing first in the group stage?
Oscarinin: It's not that we got complacent, but we weren't putting enough work into scrims—we weren't active enough or hungry enough in them. So yeah, the quality wasn’t great, and we weren’t getting as much out of them as we could.
Credit: Wojciech Wandzel/Riot Games
Do you feel other teams improved more, or that Fnatic didn’t improve—or maybe even regressed?
Oscarinin: The other teams definitely got better, while we were not progressing as much. I don't think we got worse necessarily, though. Playoffs are obviously the point where every team starts playing at their best, and we just couldn't get to that point of playing well. With that in mind, it's normal that we got fucked by Karmine Corp.
Do you feel like you were caught off guard by how KC played, or that your prep for the match wasn’t quite right? We saw you take a back-step, being put on weak side while the team was trying to invest into shutting down Canna's Jayce in game one for example. Do you think this was the right approach?
Oscarinin: I don't think it was bad to do that—we were actually getting an advantage by swapping in both game one and three. I don't think that was a problem. We just did not play nearly as well as we were doing in scrims, at least in the last few days. We weren't listening to each other much. We were looking for too many plays instead of staying calm. In game one, I felt like we were in control, but we forced too many plays.
It looked like the team struggled with decision-making in key moments—like the late TP to the top lane fight in game three, or the disjointed engage around Nashor in game two. Would you pinpoint communication as the major issue plaguing Fnatic right now?
Oscarinin: The game was already pretty hard, so we were looking for something crazy to come back into the game. Regarding the toplane play, yeah, we weren’t aligned and didn’t communicate with enough urgency about the play. It didn't look good—whether it was the late TP or the decision to fight itself. We just weren’t doing the same thing, and of course we got punished for it. Like I said, we weren’t listening to each other enough and just not acting together. So many times we just got punished for that.
What do you think needs to change for summer so this doesn’t happen again?
Oscarinin: We need to really think more about how we approach scrims. We also have to work on communication in general—how we talk—and probably make more plans in-game. But that also improves with how you scrim, because through repetition and everything, you get into the right game states, and it becomes easier to do. Everything starts with scrims, it’s something everyone has to think about.
I know this loss is tough, but is there anything positive you can take away from these playoff matches or from the two splits you've played together as a team? What do you feel you’ve learned?
Oscarinin: The last two matches? I’m not sure what we can take away from them. I mean, we were in a really bad spot, and we shouldn’t have been there—we didn’t play well. What we can take from them is that we shouldn’t let ourselves end up in that position again, I guess. I don’t think there’s much to take away or anything really positive, honestly. Maybe I’m just pessimistic right now, but I can’t think of any good things after this playoffs.
How do you plan to utilize this break before summer now?
Oscarinin: We haven’t talked as a team yet, so I’m not sure what we’re going to change overall. But I’ll just keep playing the game and try to improve on the things I’m bad at—just be better for the next split. I didn’t really think about what I’d do, because I didn’t think about losing. But yeah, I’ll just keep playing.
Is there anything you’d like to say to Fnatic fans to close out the interview?
Oscarinin: I’m really sorry. This is not acceptable from us, and it’s such a big disappointment to end the split like this. We should have delivered a higher standard. I hope next split we come back with a better attitude and everything, and actually play out the split well, for all of you."
Header Photo Credit: Wojciech Wandzel/Riot Games
