DIG Zven’s Shares His Expectations Heading into the Summer Split With DIG
Zven: "Once you’ve won the LCS once, you can never go back to being okay with being second or third."
One of the most highly anticipated returns to the LCS has finally happened. After only a split off, Jesper “Zven” Svenningsen makes his debut back, not only in the LCS, but back in his original bot lane position with Dignitas’ new star-studded roster.
Why did Zven join Dignitas, how’s the team doing so far in the early stages of their split preparations, and how far will this team really go? All this and more questions were answered by Zven in our pre-split interview.
What motivated your decision to join Dignitas?
Zven: I’ll be honest, it’s the only team I could join. I really wanted to prove myself so I would take anything, and Dignitas already had a really good roster with people that I had already played with before.
When I joined, they had Licorice and Isles who I had played with on C9. I have also played with Jensen and Spica in the past, so when they were mentioned in conversations, I thought it was a really good roster. A roster of four players that I’ve already played with before, and with most of them already having won the LCS before, I felt that this was a roster with enough experience and enough firepower that I felt that we actually had a solid shot at winning the LCS!
How do you see your role evolving within the team now that you have experience in two roles professionally, and what do you hope to bring to Dignitas?
Zven: I think that now that I’ve played Support for a while, I’ve learned a lot more about bot lane matchups and how the Support role actually works and the kinds of things that AD Carry players can do to enable their Support. I’m hoping that since I already have synergy with Isles from the past that we can become a bot lane that enables each other. I really think that I can help Isles be the best version of himself. We have only scrimmed together for a week or so, so we will see how it goes.
What are your initial impressions of your new teammates and coaching staff?
Zven: Yeah, Treatz just arrived today, and I have known Treatz from the past as well because he was on TSM’s Academy team in 2019 when I was on the main team, so I saw them fairly often. We would eat dinner all together and so I’ve known him and played against him in the past. He’s a nice guy and knowledgeable about the game. We will see how it is since he started today so we haven’t seen him coach yet as he’s been remote before this.
As for Mabrey, I had a long entry interview discussion with him that went well. He had a vision for the team and an idea of what he wanted the team to be. Overall, he seemed more knowledgeable than other coaching staff.
I’m the only person that’s played with everyone else. Licorice and Jensen on C9, winning titles with both of them. I played with Spica in 2019 in the gauntlet and have been friends since then. I’ve known Isles since C9 2021-2022. I’m kind of like a bridge for the team as I know all of them and they all know me, but they don’t all know each other. It’s kind of my job to bring everyone together at first and it’s been going really well so far. Everyone is really comfortable with each other so far. It’s a really good atmosphere which is going to be a big part of what makes us better going forward.
How do you plan to adapt to fit with Dignitas’ team dynamics?
Zven: I think because I know everybody, it’s helpful that I introduced everyone to each other and started conversations to get everyone comfortable with each other. I wouldn’t say I was doing it to lead in any kind of way, but just help to set the tone. I think that’s the only adaptation that I’ve needed to do so far.
What are some key lessons or experiences from your time with previous teams that you hope to apply at Dignitas?
Zven: One thing that I really wanted is a five-man English speaking roster. I don’t really believe in the double-Korean strategy. Even though TL won the last split with three Koreans, I still don’t believe in that philosophy. That was a big selling point for Dignitas in getting Jensen and Spica.
Overall, I think if you want to win in NA, it’s more important to drop the ego and play a team game rather than try to be the best individuals. We’ve seen super teams fail for a while now where the best five players don’t win, but the best team does win. NRG is a good example of this.
A big thing that I’m trying to do and what the coaches are trying to do is make sure everyone drops their egos and plays the team game as a unit rather than individuals trying to look good. So, we’ll see how that goes!
I know that in your introduction video you mentioned that anything other than 1st is unacceptable for your standards. Can you share any specific goals or milestones you have for Dignitas along the path to winning the title?
Zven: No not really. It’s really that simple. If I don’t win, it’s a disappointment. That’s it. There are no milestones.
To win the LCS finals, you just have to win every game up to that point. Once you’ve won the LCS once, you can never go back to being okay with being second or third. If you don’t win the LCS, it’s just disappointing. That’s just how it is.”
It was officially announced that we will be going to a single round robin best-of-3 format. What do you think of these changes, and how pumped are you to play Cloud9 first?
Zven: I don’t actually care that we play Cloud9. If anything, it’s a little unfortunate that we play them first since they’ve been bootcamping in Korea for a while and have only changed one player in their roster. I think they’ll be expected to win because of that. We’ve had about two weeks of scrims with this roster, and they’ve had a month and a half with their roster and a lot more than that previously with the same core.
It feels a bit bad that there’s only one round robin of best-of-threes, but I still think that one best-of-three round robin is better than a double round robin best-of-one. So, it’s a slight upgrade and we’ll take what we can get.
There have been some discussions online regarding what is the best use of time in terms of practice. Can you describe any personal routines or practice philosophies you follow to maintain your performance in such a competitive environment? Has this changed at all now that we are in a single round robin best-of-3 format?
Zven: The format won’t change anything when it comes to scrims. We play three games, one hour break, and three more games. After the scrims, I play solo queue with every hour I have and I go to the gym four times a week. If I’m not doing any of those, like when I’m in queue, I’ll watch VODs of LPL or LCK games. Right now I’m watching LEC as well because it was on this weekend. I don’t do much else other than that. I don’t go out much otherwise and eat in the house obviously.
I basically just scrim, eat, gym, solo queue, and repeat. That’s my go-to.
You’ve been playing professionally in major regions for almost 10 years now, and a big discussion in recent years is about the necessary changes for the longevity of the professional scene. In your experience of almost a decade and across the two major western leagues, what do you feel like is still missing, or even something we’ve lost over the years that would help ensure the prosperity of the scene?
Zven: Honestly, I just think a lot of players these days just don’t have a lot of personality and don’t make a lot of content. Back in the day, a lot of the pros were dragging people to the LCS because they were famous streamers: Bjergsen, Imaqtpie, Doublelift, Sneaky. There was a lot of content going out like TSM: Legends, and everyone had active Twitter profiles.
The pros were just more engaged with the community and nowadays maybe half the pro players in the league, I don’t even know if they have Twitter profiles. No one cares about them because no one knows them. They don’t stream, they don’t appear on broadcast, they don’t appear in content, and just don’t do anything besides the bare minimum. That’s why people are less attached to the LCS when people like Bjergsen and Doublelift retire because they care about those players. They watched their streams, their content, and watched those teams for those players. The LCS was so popular in the olden days.
The second problem is that people don’t want to watch the worst major region. NA is solidly the fourth best region. I think that’s fair enough to say. We don’t compete with anybody except the EU, but G2 keeps the EU as the third best region in the world. A lot of people don’t see why they should watch NA over EU, Korea, or China. Yeah, sure, we speak English in NA, but if you look at a team like Immortals, none of their players stream, none of them are brand-heavy favourites, so why would you care about IMT games over a team from a different region that’s better? The same could be said about the last Dignitas roster. I think that’s a big part of it. Playing better internationally even just one time would revive the scene as well. We’ll see what happens.
So, what are the odds of a Dignitas Gym Stream?
Zven: Nah, definitely not going to stream our gym sessions, but I mean Spica streams, and I’ve been in content, and I have some content in the works coming out soon, too. I’ve been doing this with Riot and the LCS to keep the scene active and alive. It’s on the players to be marketable and be out there. I hope that other pro players and orgs do the same. Give people a reason to watch and like them.
We’d like to thank Zven for taking the time to sit down with us right before the start of the LCS Summer Split to discuss the team and give us his insights on the future of the team, and the professional scene as a whole!
If you’d like to hear and see more of Zven, check out his socials:
