G2 BrokenBlade on being a pro player: “It means the world to me and I don’t take any part of this for granted”

Having returned to the international stage once more, BrokenBlade had already shown up massively for G2 in their clean 2-0s during play-ins. Now approaching the main stage having qualified with their win over PSG Talon, we sat down with BB to speak about the home turf buff and his personal and team goals.

Despite winning the Winter LEC split 2023 and making it through to playoffs for another time, fans had been skeptical about the current G2 roster despite their success. This doubt had led to G2's domination over other teams to come as a surprise to some, we asked BB what it felt like to be underestimated and compared to the 2019 MSI winning G2 roster.

Does being on the international stage add an additional pressure or is it something you enjoy?

BrokenBlade: It’s more pressure because there is more on the line, more people watching you, more people on stage, more people watching live, and more interviews which is nice as it gives people a chance to get to know you better.

I like it I embrace it, if you’re a pro player and you don’t embrace pressure you’ll choke and crumble.

You’ve been on the international stage before, so what prep do you do to prepare yourself for being on the international stage instead of the LEC stage?

BrokenBlade: We usually want to keep it similar, we don’t want to change a lot of our routine. Why we are good and why I guess anyone is good consistently is because they have a good routine, the place we practice is different so we see what we might need to change. Our staff are good at handling that, we had challenges with where the PCs were and the room was getting really warm. But I think we are doing well and I'm excited for upcoming matches.

Some had expected this to be a 2-1. What are your thoughts on this?

BrokenBlade: I can see why people would think it’s a 2-1 as our first game is very explosive sometimes. In the first game today we were really clean until we weren’t, that’s the best way to put it. Up until the Nash we had a very good game and were playing well.

I gave into the excitement but usually in those moments I'm usually the one to calm it down, but when the guy who says calm down doesn’t, then we can go really crazy. But we did a good job after that, and it went very clean into very messy into very clean into a very clean second game.

Do you feel pressure to ensure G2 does well considering their legacy on the international stage?

BrokenBlade: G2’s whole organization is there to win, if we don’t win like in Spring, then it’s not good enough. Every player and staff member behind this org feels the same, we want to win the whole thing. We want the game to be as hard to win as possible for the enemy team, so they struggle to take a game off us – but they didn’t [smiles]. But that was only play-ins, now we are going into the main stage which is very exciting but I'm not sure how the main stage teams are going to play yet, we’ve only briefly scrimmed one of those teams.

I think we are all super good, you could call us a super roster, we are all very good mechanically, we are good kind-hearted people, and everyone is creative and can drop their guard with our team. The same for staff. What makes us a super team, is not only the players, it’s the coaching staff and the general staff behind us – a lot of people don’t see the work they do so I want to give them credit and appreciate them. They are a huge part of our consistency and success.

How does it feel to compete on the home turf of Europe over traveling to Asia or the USA?

BrokenBlade: It’s very different, usually we have to travel – it’s a long time to fly, then get used to the time zone – for us, at the beginning of the tournament we had an advantage. You always have the advantage at the beginning if you are in your home region; because you don’t have to get used to any time differences, used to the food, or the language around you. For us, it was quite an advantage compared to Asian teams, but in the end, it stops mattering. Everyone has the same PC, the same internet, and it just comes down to who is going to play better.

What do you think you bring to the team and as a representative of the EU region?

BrokenBlade: We bring the best roster we have ever produced, the 2019 G2 was very strong and we get compared to them a lot. We want to achieve more than that though, we want to win Worlds and that’s what we are aiming at. We are aiming for more, not for the same, we don’t just want to be in finals, but right now we focus on MSI. I think we’re doing good, we won our matches 2-0 and are doing well.

What does it mean to you to be a pro player?

BrokenBlade: To be a pro player means the world to me, it’s basically my life, I’ve been pursuing this thing with a lot of passion and love for the game. There’s been a lot of factors as to why I can do this job, my hobby is now my job. That’s a lot to my family – I have two brothers who were gaming, and I started playing League because of my cousin, there are a lot of factors as to why I became a pro player.

But now I'm here embracing it every single day, I couldn’t have done it without anyone who was on my path on my way here. I'm thankful for the fans too, my career didn’t start great but I still had a lot of support from the community and that helped me a lot. It means the world to me and I don’t take any part of this for granted, I put in the work every single day to be better than so many people in the world and hopefully some day, the best.

What’s your favorite thing about MSI being hosted in London this year?

BrokenBlade: I can invite my friends here, I can have my friends come watch me because when it’s in Korea or USA, it’s hard for them to see because plane tickets are expensive. Probably going to have my brother and friends come for the main stage, I would like for them to see me win.

Follow esports.gg for all the latest esports news and updates across League of Legends