have
secured their 19th LEC title after defeating
3–2 in an exciting Spring Split Final. With the victory, they lifted the trophy once again and locked in the first seed for EMEA heading into the upcoming Mid-Season Invitational. However, despite the result, the performance in the final was far from what many G2 fans had come to expect from the team, with several shaky moments across the series leaving questions about their form going forward.
In an interview with
Sheep Esports,
, G2’s AD carry, reflects on the team’s preparation and what issues the team had during the Spring Final. He opens up about the need to reset mentally, build better practice habits, and adapt to international competition ahead of MSI.
It's your 10th LEC title. How do you feel about that?
Steven "Hans Sama" Liv: "I feel nice, I didn't know it was my 10th title, I like the 2-digit number. But I am not thinking too much about the title, I'm thinking more internationally. But it feels nice to have a lot of titles here.
How do you feel about the preparation heading to MSI?
Hans Sama: I feel like MSI is just going to be a nice adventure if we decide it to be. It's in our control to make it good or bad. So for me, it's going to be exciting, and I need to do the good preparation, mental preparation, to welcome any challenges that come because that's what you need to have the best practices. I think we need to develop good habits for good practice. So then we have good chances to be in a top shape as a team, and that's what I'm aiming at. And firstly, it's just going to be for me to reflect and rest firstly, and slowly prepare for the MSI. I think we're going to do well. I really want to do well for MSI, to be honest.
You did say on the broadcast that compared to last year, you were way more knowledgeable, and it's a matter of just applying that knowledge into the game. Can you maybe walk me through what the concrete steps are that you're going to take right now? So you said you're going to be resting for now, then what?
Hans Sama: I will be resting, reflecting on the playoffs for myself. I'll maybe take two, three days off from League and then start grinding again, thinking about how I want to approach the practice for myself so I can be the best ever I can be. We're going to get to Korea at some point, and I think the whole trip needs to be, for me, as exciting as possible. I want to have fun during the whole trip and really talk about the game. Talk with my support a lot about what do we want to achieve, what do we want to do. Talk about the concept, understand them, relearn them again, like the knowledge and stuff. Because you need to play different ways, or like you need to learn different concepts when you play against Asian teams is really important compared to your teams. So I think preparing that aspect is important, and just getting my mind into those things all the time is going to be nice. And really enjoy the experience and build my confidence through the practice, but I need to plan well.
That's interesting because even on broadcast, Andrei "Odoamne" Pascu said that in interviews and publicly, you look like you're cool and very focused on the objective, but then, when you play, you're more confident and ruthless. What do you think about that?
Hans Sama: On stage, I do make sure to be confident. Sometimes it doesn't work out like today. Today I was playing super badly, holy moly. I'm glad that we won. But I think, for example, two weeks ago I came to the match with the idea that I'm just going to be the best in this match, and I'm confident. Anything that will happen to me in the game, I'll be ready for it. Most of the time, I think I'm confident. For this match, I didn't really have the greatest preparation, and sadly, I didn't show such a good performance. I'm a little bit sad about it, but I need to move forward and become stronger again, because I have shown that I'm very strong. I just need to focus up and do well.
You also said that you feel like you didn't perform really well, and this is something that also part of the community seems to bring up more often, that the G2 botlane needs to improve in some aspects. How do you try to balance your need to be confident with the knowledge that a lot of people look down on you?
Hans Sama: Well, I don't really read what people say. I don't really care what they say. From my point of view, the story from the team is the most important thing. I mean, honestly, I just need to focus more on my health because this whole week I have been sick, and I couldn't have the energy to prepare well, and I kind of failed. And yeah, that's why going into the game felt bad. But for the other games,
and I stepped up a lot during the Split. We were winning the bot most of the time, even if the matchup was bad and was impacting the map a lot. So for sure, for me overall, I was happy about the Split. And for the First Stand, I think that was a nice experience. I think apart from the Finals, it was good, right? But yeah, can't keep dwelling on what happened before, I can just reflect on it and be ready for the next tournament, which is going to be soon.
Talking about today's match, can you tell me a bit about how you and your team came up with game five's draft? Who called the Nasus and Senna?
Hans Sama: I think the Nasus was more like a pocket pick, scales well into the game. I think the coaches were calling it.
was calling it. For me, I just needed to find a carry that is strong against Varus. I was a little bit out of picks, so I just took Senna and tried to survive. But yeah, I’m very happy that we could go through the early game because we knew that we scaled well in this game. We just knew what needed to happen in the game. At some point, I was just following Nasus in the jungle and was just like farming with him to gain my stacks. I think it was a good strategy.
I also wanted to ask you about Luka "Perkz" Perković being kind of like a secret coach for G2. How was he brought into the team, and what have you done in the last few weeks with him?
Hans Sama: I would say he brings some good energy to the team. Sometimes, we lack energy, and he also brings in this one side of knowledge, which we apply a lot more in these games. Maybe it's obvious to see, but he brings those micro aspects of communication, what to say so that everyone is on the same page, and actually things we didn't do all Split. He just makes sure that we are all on the same page, and he's very smart in what he says. But yeah, I definitely like how he brings the energy to the team, which also helps me as well.
Do you feel like that was a missing link that the team needed? Was energy missing in the team?
Hans Sama: [Perkz] brings a lot of knowledge to the game. He does a nice job with
as well. He talks a lot to him about the game. So that's nice, and also energy is part of that as well. Yeah, I think he gave us a lot of good things. It’s definitely nice to have him around.
Do you have anything to say to LEC fans, even mentioning KC if you want, about what you guys will bring to MSI?
Hans Sama: Not putting too much pressure. It's always nice to feel the support of fans, to believe in us at MSI. We definitely feel it. So make sure to support us at MSI, and we're going to do our best to make you guys proud, to make Europe proud. Yeah, I'm also going to do my best for MSI, I really care about it."
