Looking at the schedule for the first day of action of the Six Invitational 2023, Soniqs' clash against Team Liquid stood out for obvious reasons.
Not only did the match feature two of the best four teams at the Six Jönköping Major, but it was also Ben "CTZN" McMillan's debut for Soniqs.
"He adapted perfectly since the team environment is super open and easy to get used to, it allowed him to find comfort a lot faster," Pablo "Gryxr" Rebeil said to SiegeGG moments after his team's victory against Team Liquid.
CTZN's debut went as well as they would have hoped, with the Brit registering the best KOST of the match (82 percent) and a perfect entry balance of 5-0 (+5). Meanwhile, Team Liquid were all over the place, as Luccas "Paluh" Molina went quiet alongside André "NESKWGA" Oliveira, who only had a SiegeGG Rating of 0.57.
Both the best player of the game, Richie "Rexen" Coronado, and Gryxr were also interestingly primarily playing Frost on defense -- and both excelled. When asked about the pick, Gryxr highlighted the team's ease at being "capable of playing any operator to its best ability", which allowed "people to be more flexible".
Gryxr had alluded to this flexibility prior to the event as well, having told SiegeGG in an interview that CTZN provided their team with the most flexibility of any other potential replacement for Evan "Kanzen" Bushore.
Eventually, Soniqs' adaptation and superior ability today to win gunfights gave them the upper hand in the series. Team Liquid's pick Villa fell into the hands of Soniqs in 7-4 fashion. That marked the Brazilians' fourth loss of the season on the Italian map after having played it on 13 occasions across Year 7.
According to Gryxr, his team's success will come from a "focus on [its] game and (its) own plays" and reiterated that the team feels "unstoppable" when playing at its own pace.
Soniqs will head to Day 2 of the Six Invitational 2023 after having beaten the main favorites to top the Group B standings. But, despite the victory against the Jönköping Major grand-finalists, none of the Soniqs players are getting ahead of themselves -- the team's mentality is to take things on a "game by game basis" rather than to be "worried about the end result".
Tomorrow, Soniqs will play against Wolves Esports, who are yet to win a BO3 match this season following the team's heavy loss to MNM Gaming earlier today. Catch them in action at 10AM UTC-5.