Karmine Corp took care of business on Saturday, January 24, by defeating
SK Gaming on the opening day of the second week of
LEC Versus. Once again, the French organization was able to rely on the performances of their AD carry, Caliste "
Caliste" Henry-Hennebert.
With a 3–1 start to the season, the French player, now entering his second year in the LEC, remains highly optimistic about the quality of his roster and its overall potential. Ahead of Sunday’s matchup against
G2 Esports, he spoke with
Sheep Esports to reflect on his team’s early-season form.
What is your first reaction after today's win?
Caliste "Caliste" Henry-Hennebert: "I’m happy with the win. I think we controlled the game, even if we could have done so better. There are a few things to review — it’s not just about the opposing team making mistakes and us capitalizing on them; it’s more on us to proactively create plays, and we missed some opportunities. That’s actually positive, because it gives us concrete material to review and learn from. For example, we danced around Baron a lot this game, so there are several timing decisions we’ll need to reassess — what we could have done better, and so on. We take the win and come away with plenty to work on, which is good.
Are you satisfied with the level you’ve shown at the start of the season?
Caliste: Overall, yes, but we’re clearly capable of much more. Even today, we were still a bit shaky, still somewhat hesitant to move forward, but that’s gradually fading. With every match, things get better, which is really encouraging. We’re on the right path. We just need to be able to show our full potential on stage, without fear or hesitation, and then we’ll be in the best possible conditions.
Last week, you lost to Movistar KOI and beat Los Ratones in a rather messy fashion. What did you focus on this week in response to that?
Caliste: We only have three days of practice, so it’s difficult to recreate the exact scenarios we face on stage. We didn’t really focus on any single overarching objective. In general, we just try to improve everything we can. We reviewed our games and identified areas where we really need to get better. But there weren’t any major guiding principles. The game against Los Ratones was messy, but mostly slow because they were the ones who had to create plays. On top of that, we had an early-game bug that made things complicated for Yike (Martin Sundelin), so the game felt a bit strange overall. In the end, we just needed our champions to come together so we could teamfight.
Do you feel your role within the team has changed compared to last year?
Caliste: Not fundamentally. I still need to be very strong individually and serve as a pillar in terms of gameplay, so that I’m always in a position to carry games if needed. Maybe the main difference is that I need to be even more present in communication than last year, especially early on. Later, it might smooth out, but at the start, definitely.
Where do you think you need to improve to become the undisputed number one in your role?
Caliste: Honestly, everywhere. I don’t think I’m at my best right now. I know I can be better, so I’m working a lot on that. I do a lot of individual work with Zeph (Quentin Viguié), especially on macro. I’m still far from being the best ADC in the world, so pretty much every aspect of my game needs work. That will probably always be the case — I think there’s always something to improve, no matter what.
When you say you’re not at your maximum right now, which aspects of the game are you referring to, and how do you explain that?
Caliste: I think I’m in a good spot overall, but individually, there are moments when I feel like I click better, faster, more precisely — when everything just feels clean. Sometimes, I feel almost perfect mechanically. Right now, I notice in-game that I make a few bad clicks. Most of the time, I don’t really feel it during the game itself; I mostly notice it afterward during review.
What’s your first impression of your duo with Alan " Busio " Cwalinaon stage? Is it going the way you hoped so far?
Caliste: Yeah, I think it’s going pretty well. We’re not a botlane that’s going to lose lanes often, and when we’re supposed to win, we know how to win. We mostly just follow the draft plan and what we’re supposed to do. I think we’ll rarely get pushed around unless we’re in very unfavorable matchups. Sometimes you lose because the matchup dictates it, but the most important thing is knowing how much you can afford to lose. Overall, we’re pretty happy, even though we’re obviously still far from our peak. I’m excited to see how we’ll look by summer. We work every day and talk every day about how to improve. And honestly, both Busio and I are still not at 100% on stage compared to scrims, so I’m really looking forward to seeing how we can become even more aggressive.
More generally, how is it going with the new players on the roster? Do you get the same feeling you had at the start of last season?
Caliste: Yes, pretty much the same feeling as last year. Based on what we see in practice, I feel like this can go even further, at least in terms of our thinking and the ideas we’re developing. But it’s always tricky because the Winter Split is often a kind of honeymoon phase, especially when you keep winning. It’s hard to really assess where you stand and whether problems will emerge later in the season or whether your level will drop. For now, I’m happy, and we’ll see. In any case, we’ll know at the end of the season whether this is better than last year or not.
Regarding Kang " kyeahoo " Yea-hoo, what do you see as his biggest in-game strength so far?
Caliste: kyeahoo is a very strong laner. I’ve rarely seen him get pushed around. Individually, he’s really solid, that’s his main strength.
You’re going to play G2 on Sunday, who are coming off two strong performances. How do you approach a match like that?
Caliste: Our first real test was against MKOI, and now this will be the second one against G2. What’s good is that there were three or four days in between, so we’ll see if we’ve truly learned from those games. We can already see that G2 learned a lot from their first week. it’s going to be a very contested match, and I’m excited. At KC, we know G2 pretty well, so we should have a good idea of what to expect. I’m also really looking forward to the botlane matchup — I haven’t played against Hans Sama (Steven Liv) in a long time. From what I understand, neither of us is in peak form right now, so maybe there’ll be some strange moments. It’s always enjoyable to play against Hans. I consider him the best AD Carry in the LEC, he’s always very solid, even during his weaker periods. G2 are rarely a team you beat easily, so we’ll have to be very disciplined.
Where would you currently place your team relative to your main competitors? What do you think you're lacking to match G2 and KOI now?
Caliste: What we’re really missing is having our coordination at 100% on stage and showing the same willingness to fight that we have in scrims. We see a lot of plays and fight angles, but either we misunderstand each other or we hesitate a bit on the execution, whereas in scrims we wouldn’t, and it would work out."
