Following FUT Esports' victory and advancement to the EWC 2026 semifinals, we spoke with the team's Ukrainian player, cmtry. In the conversation, he shared insights on the tough comeback on Dust II, confident play on Ancient, and his expectations for the upcoming semifinal against FURIA.
The full interview with cmtry following FUT Esports' victory is available on YouTube now!
On the first map, Dust II, you were getting 0-5 and coming back. Then the additional rounds, how did you manage to get to the end, resulting in winning the map?
I think we just started slow. We start shit on Dust because it's not our, like, good map. We're playing this map not good. We have a lot of problems on this map, but we decided just to play our game to don't overthink, and if we lose Dust, we can have two more our good maps. So we just kind of take our, like, heads and start to play good. I still think we didn't play a good CT side, but some rounds we just killed them. So, for example, some rounds in CT which we won, we shouldn't have win, never, but because I think we have good firepower in our team, we were just killing them.
In comparison, the second map was quite easy for you, it looks like. What can you tell about the second map?
So, about Ancient, we're pretty good on this map. We feel ourselves super confident there. I think in my opinion we were always one step ahead enemy, and krabeni was calling amazing on the Ancient T side, and that's why we closed a lot of rounds. But also on Ancient T, we shouldn't have won some clutches. It was some shaky anti-ecos, but because we have insane firepower, how I said, we won that.
Okay. After this win, this victory, in the Valve ranking you outperformed NAVI. What are your thoughts about it? Like, you were part of NAVI before...
I mean, we had some jokes about it. I'm really happy, and my team like really happy to feel that we're becoming a strong tier-1 team. We're really happy to be in top 10, in top 7. Also, it feels good to be like right now above NAVI, but about Valve ranking, every week it can change. One week we are above them, one week they are above us, so that's it.
You mentioned top 10 or top 7 on the ranking, is it the plan for the team?
I mean, we have goals, of course. We want to win events, it's our main goal. But about the ranking, we're trying to keep like top 10, top 5, top 7 for getting invites for every event to play it. About ranking, we don't have any huge goal, we just want to win every game and want to win tier-1 events.
What about this event? Are you happy with the result? You got to the semifinals.
Yeah, we didn't talk about our expectations for this event, but my main expectation was that... xfl0ud is a new guy for us, we still didn't get used to each other in some moments, so I was thinking that we can do it to quarterfinals, and it was my expectation. Now we have like really good chance to make it to final, so like everyone and me also, we're really happy about it.
You'll play against FURIA. And it looks like you're both like kind of home teams, you have very good fans. It will be very loud. What are your thoughts about this game that you'll play?
FURIA game gonna be really hard for us because we're still young and it's hard to play in pressure. I think also FURIA has a better maps, they will have a better veto for this game in my opinion. And the crowd also, they have insane fans. But we have also, so I think it's gonna be really good fight, it's gonna be really good game.
And the final question: you are one of the two Ukrainians still playing in the tournament. What is it for you playing for your country?
I'm really happy to represent Ukraine in some events. I see a lot of comments from Ukrainians to me. I'm really happy that Ukrainians like me and dem0n, they support us. I read a lot, and I'm really happy to represent Ukraine in this event, how I said.
Thank you.
Thank you.
FUT Esports faces a tough semifinal match against FURIA ahead. We wish the team success in their fight for a spot in the grand final, and our Ukrainian players cmtry and dem0n confident gameplay and victory! 🇺🇦🔥
As a reminder, dem0n: "We are definitely not weaker than NAVI" — on FUT's confidence, FURIA, and performing at EWC 2026.
