After the final match of Group A at IEM Rio 2023, Natus Vincere's sniper Oleksandr s1mple Kostyliev reflected a little on his team's chances of winning the coveted trophy.

English-speaking analyst and manager of Bad News Eagles, James Banks, asked Oleksandr: "Do you consider yourself favorites at the tournament?" To which he received the following response:

Yes. Earlier I gave an interview and there were headlines that I called teams weak. But that's not what I meant. I think Heroic and Vitality are in very good form right now. Cloud9 and FaZe are exhausted because they had a tough path to the Major qualifiers. I just want to play against a good opponent, and I don't remember when we last played against Vitality.

 Oleksandr s1mple Kostyliev  

Recall that yesterday Natus Vincere started their performance excellently at IEM Rio Intel Extreme Masters Rio 2023. In the first match, the born-to-win team defeated TheMongolz from Mongolia 1-0, and then also easily defeated Ninjas in Pyjamas, winning the meeting 2-0!

You can find out about all the results of the first game day at IEM Rio 2023 here.

s1mple and his team have already advanced to the playoff stage of the championship, but today at 19:30 in the match against BIG, the teams will decide who will go straight to the semifinals and who will go to the quarterfinals.

Recall that IEM Rio 2023 is taking place from April 17-23 in Brazil. The prize pool of the championship is $250,000. It is also worth knowing that the winner will receive a spot at IEM Cologne 2023!