In anticipation of the BLAST Premier: Spring Groups 2024, Danny "zonic" Sørensen, the coach of Team Falcons, gave a major interview where he shared some details about Falcons.
In November 2023, the Dane left Team Vitality and then joined Team Falcons, where his main task was to assemble a strong tier-1 lineup.
We will leave a link to the original interview below, but especially for our site readers, we have gathered the most interesting parts of the interview and laid it out for you in a convenient format.
After leaving Vitality, zonic was not chilling but "working 24/7" to assemble a competitive roster that now fully satisfies him:
We've been working 24/7 in assembling a roster that we feel could compete on the highest level. I'm super excited and satisfied to sit with the roster that I have right now, and I'm looking forward to starting the season.
After zonic joined Falcons, he proposed a list of players he bet on to the club. However, due to tight timeframes associated with the RMR tournament, these transfers couldn't be executed, and many of the chosen players declined the offers.
Negotiating with clubs turned out to be a challenging task, as the departure of players posed a risk that the team would not make it to the major and, accordingly, not earn money from stickers. Although Falcons offered significant compensation for buying players, this didn't much facilitate the negotiation process.
Organizations and players also created problems when they publicly stated that they refused to move to Falcons.
Acquiring the core of team ENCE was key, as it ensured invitations to the RMR and Katowice tournaments. Considering that in 2025, partner leagues will probably no longer exist, this significantly strengthens Falcons' position, freeing them from the need to participate in second-tier tournaments.
Out of respect for some players, I won't go into too many details, but when I joined, I made a priority list. For example, I had four players that I wanted for the AWP role. For the IGL role, I had two or three players, the same with all the roles. But getting players so close to a Major cycle, with the open qualifier starting in January, meant a lot of teams were hesitant to even negotiate with Falcons.Even though we paid a fairly decent price for their players, if they sold them, they would not qualify for the Major, and then they would probably lose financially in the end due to the sticker money. So it was very difficult to negotiate with players. When we got some public resistance from some players or teams who made it public that they rejected our offer, it also complicated the process. But in the end, it worked out really well, and we got the ENCE core, which also meant that we were directly through to the RMR and got invited to Katowice. That is super underrated because, in just one year, there will be no more partnership leagues, which means that only the top teams will be getting invites for the big tournaments.
We all know that being part of the tier-two scene, where you have to play open qualifiers, closed qualifiers, and play all the time, is just an unforgiving life. I'm happy to be a part of BLAST and be invited to the big tournaments, now it's only up to ourselves.
Remember, the lineup of Team Falcons looks like this:
BOROS had issues with responsibility. He could be late or not show up on time. However, when he was firmly told that he needed to step up as a professional, he improved.
When it comes to in-game stuff, he also had a bad reputation except for his aim, and I think it's also down to how you work with him. He's not there fully yet, but he is putting up really strong numbers in practice, and I can definitely see why. We had an eye on him at the RMR, not to get him to Vitality, but he was just one of the guys that everyone was talking about during the tournament when he was playing with Monte.It didn't matter for him if he was playing on the big stage or playing against good teams, he was just going to go there and take his fights. And I think that's a really strong trait to have as an up-and-coming player. It feels like the bigger stage it is, or the better the opponent he plays against, the better he plays. For me to have such a player is something that I look forward to, but he's young and he still has a long way to go.
We got told a lot of things and also put a lot of focus on the things that we heard, and I also saw some of the issues myself. But I also felt that when you're part of a system, it's much easier to adapt and learn. He has really impressed me so far. In the beginning, he came late, he didn't respond in time. But then he also learned, he was told that he needed to step up these things and become more professional in a very harsh way, and he did.
Falcons will not be very prepared for BLAST, and although they will play all 6 maps, they will be quite raw. Their main priority lies in the RMR tournament.
Falcons' goal at the moment is to establish themselves as a team that can regularly contend for the playoffs of every tournament.
BLAST Premier: Spring Groups 2024 will take place from January 22 to 28 in Copenhagen, Denmark. Teams will compete for a prize pool of $190,000, as well as slots in subsequent series competitions. The group stage of the BLAST Premier Spring Groups, in which 16 teams will participate for the first time, starts on January 22. The competition will include 12 usual partners and four new participants: GamerLegion, Falcons, Spirit, and Virtus.pro.
SOURCE - HLTV
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