“I want to face all the strong teams even if I get owned” C9 Zellsis talks about teams he wants to face

At the VCT Americas Superweek, Cloud9 took on NRG in the first game. In a best-of-three series, Cloud9 defeated NRG and later defeated Furia to close the superweek with a 2-0 record. After their win over NRG, Strafe had an opportunity to interview Cloud9’s Jordan “Zellsis” Montemurro. In an exclusive one-on-one interview, C9 Zellsis talks about the NRG win, Bind, facing Furia and more. 

Q. Congratulations on your win. This was one of the biggest wins for Cloud9 as NRG is supposedly one of the strongest teams in VCT Americas. You are now 3-1 and have already played LOUD and NRG, what are your thoughts on the win?

C9 Zellsis: “ Honestly, this win is super huge for us. I know we fumbled with LOUD after the first map. And coming into NRG super week, Obviously you want to win all the games but our realistic hope was that we go 1-1 this week hopefully.  And getting this win against NRG and them being such a good team and we pulled back after the first map. We had a rough first map and winning from that feels super good”

Q. What went wrong in the first map?

C9 Zellsis: “I think the biggest thing in the first map wasn’t even the shooting. It was just that we had good game plans but we were super hesitant. We weren’t as confident as usual. Usually on the first map we come out guns blazing but I don’t know I think it was the nerves. We just weren’t really confident in ourselves and they capitalised on that. I think s0m and Victor had really great map and it ties into that”

Q. Starting on Map 2 Cloud9 played super well. Especially on a personal level you popped off. What changed after the first map?

C9 Zellsis: “I think the biggest thing was more confidence. Like I think I was really hot on the first half of the first map but I really fell flat after their streak of run they had. I whiffed a little bit, tried to buy the Vandal. Vandal just does not work for me, I am a phantom player. And it's kinda just, I didn’t get into the positions to fight. They just snowballed and so that was kind of me falling short.And on Harbor, obviously on Pearl I am more active with that role rather than Sentinel. I can move a little bit more freely and take more fights a little more comfortably and I think we kinda found a little bit of our groove. mCe paused between halves on Pearl, we were still flat, still down on energy, not really confident. We got lucky with some rounds and I think mCe gave us a really good pep talk and we woke up a little bit more on the second map.”

Q. What are your thoughts on the map change?

C9 Zellsis: “Personally I hated Icebox. Pearl and Icebox go hand in hand where you kinda just like rush B repeatedly and if B is not working rush A and I think that’s kinda both maps. I am happy that Icebox is back. And I really started to like Bind when I joined the team, we played it a little bit at the Red Bull event. I like it now. So we will have to see what happens, if we play it or not. If we do, everyone knows it's going to be fun. So maybe we will throw out some random comp on the map. Coz qpert and mCe cook a lot on the server. Qpert’s always on the server cooking up some random stuff for some random agents we might just play. I think we’ll be alright with our team”

Q. You’d face Furia next, what are your thoughts on the team and the game?

C9 Zellsis: “I haven’t really been watching Furia, they have had some good games. I was kinda backing them a little bit in their games you know Brazil represent. But dgzin said something about leaf, disrespected him or something I don’t know but all I know is we are going to come in and we are going to 2-0 those m’ers.”

(Cloud9 did beat Furia 2-0)

Q. Which team will be the toughest to face after Furia?

C9 Zellsis: “I would personally like to replay LOUD. Every game we have had has been close or iffy or what not and that’s just Valorant. But LOUD just played so well against us, Especially Aspas and Less played so well against us. We kinda felt disrespected or I felt disrespected on Ascent at least they were kinda running me down. And that was kinda in the NRG game and they were trying to run me down, we swapped it up or I changed it up. And I think if we rematch against LOUD, I hope the game will be a little bit different. So I would love to play LOUD again, Or the team we haven’t played will be Leviatan. I would like to play them and we play them soon two weeks I think”

Q. What do you think C9 needs to work on to become the best team in the Americas?

C9 Zellsis: “I think the main thing we need to do is keep our head down and keep doing what we are doing. We are doing everything right, right now and I think that’s the big thing, I think we just have to keep working and pushing forward with what we are doing. I think everything we are doing right, between server time, between practice, between individual schedules. We just need to make sure everyone’s well rested, everyone’s focused and I think as long as our heads are down and we are up on the energy and playing together and stuff like that we’d be good”

Q. What are your expectations from the season?

C9 Zellsis: “I don’t have any expectations for the season, I still go match by match. I would like to place first or second because I don’t know how the playoffs are yet but I know it’s six teams and if they do it how they do and if they give first and second seed the semifinals then we only have to win one game to qualify for Masters Tokyo. So I would like to be the first or second seed. Other than that I don’t really care because you have to play everyone anyways”

Q. Which team are you looking forward to facing the most internationally?

C9 Zellsis: “I think a team I wanna face internationally again is Fnatic. I wanna face the best teams even if I get owned. and wanna see what they do, how they feel stuff like that. I haven’t played Fnatic since Iceland and they owned us. Other than that, I wanna play DRX again”

Cloud9 concluded the superweek with a 4-1 record and are in a really strong position to close the regular season as the second seed if not the first seed. They will face Sentinels next who themselves aren’t in the best of positions and will be missing a crucial player in TenZ for the rest of the season. 

The VCT Americas Week 6 action starts 29th August. You can follow VCT Americas Twitter for all the updates on VCT Americas.

Credits: Riot Games

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