Bodyy on EPL: “All the past months were of hard work”

Bodyy wants to show that Fnatic’s last few months have been a lot of hard work.

On the verge of starting ESL Pro League (EPL) Season 19, Alexandre "bodyy" Pianaro spoke about his experience of being Fnatic's new captain. He also talked about the expectations for the competition.

In recent years, Fnatic has embraced the international project and bodyy has been the team's new captain since November 2023. Bodyy also talked about his experience with calling in English.

"My first experience in English was in Falcons when we added BOROS, lauNx, and mhL to the team. I've had some time to talk and learn [how] to express myself in English. Obviously, it wasn't the best environment to grow and to build up, so I wouldn't say that was such a big experience and not a long time as well. When I joined ITB as [a] stand-in — new people, new culture, it's not easy to create something in that short time."

Bodyy had only French experiences before Falcons became international (Image via PGL)

"When Fnatic picked me up, that was my first time calling in English, speaking about my ideas in English, my background, how's my vision of the game to the players and the coach. We had to make sure we were on the same page and speak the same Counter-Strike language."

EPL as an opportunity to show work

Fnatic fans have already witnessed the organization win several trophies in Counter-Strike. However, recent years have shown a different reality. In his first six months as captain of Fnatic, Bodyy has come to believe that the team needed more time, especially after missing out on the first CS2 Major.

"This team was built six months ago. Our expectations were to qualify for the Major, which we didn't. I can't say this satisfied me or anyone in the team. This team was new, time was needed to build a culture and a structure for this team. We have youngsters, some of us have never played in international teams, so we have to put all the pieces together."

"I think people don't realize it's always hard to build a new team and time is obviously needed. We are coming to this tournament to prove that all the past months were of hard work."

Players come and go, but KRIMZ has been on Fnatic's active roster since 2016 (Image via ESL)

Bodyy and the EPL group stage

EPL starts tomorrow. For bodyy, this is the most stacked and toughest group in the competition. Even with SAW in Cloud9's place, bodyy has no doubts about the group's abilities.

"I reckon that we have the hardest group stage of the tournament, I think. In my opinion, we have the most stacked group. SAW replaced Cloud9. Probably the group was even more stacked before, but SAW is a really strong team and they have been beating us. I’m sure they can do damage in this group."

Goals for the tournament

"My goal is to go to playoffs, but we definitely need a big result in LAN and a big reference match that maybe we had [online]. But that’s not our goal and not Fnatic's expectations, [either]. We want to get a big match [in] the bag and make it to playoffs. It's definitely doable. Our preparation has been great. Beating Virtus.pro, [which] is one of [the] hardest teams that we have been facing recently, would be a relief to us. Now that they have electroNic, they will be even better."

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Bodyy on EPL: “All the past months were of hard work”

EPL as an opportunity to show work

Bodyy and the EPL group stage

Goals for the tournament