fastPay Wildcats’ top laner, Soner “StarScreen” Kaya, sat down with Gamelevate after their loss to Royal Never Give Up to talk about their improvements from last MSI, taking on the CBLOL and representing Turkey.

Carrying the hopes of the TCL, the fastPay Wildcats attended their first Mid Season Invitational in 2021. However, their performance disappointed fans as they went 1-5. Now, the Wildcats look for revenge as they return to the international stage to make Turkey proud. Returning to the lineup is Soner “StarScreen” Kaya, who looks to make his name known as a threat in the Top Lane.

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The following interview has been edited for length and clarity. We would like to thank John from the TCL for providing translations.

StarScreen, thank you for taking the time to speak with us today. This is your second MSI. What does it mean to you to represent the TCL at MSI?

It is an extremely important feeling for me. Representing the region as a whole, as a team, and as an individual is extremely important to me. And our first goal is basically to get out of groups and not repeat our previous performance, which was kind of disappointing.

Today you faced off against probably one of the tournament favorites in RNG. And I want to know even in the loss, was there anything that you learned from this game that you can take away with you to hopefully make it out of the group stage?

Well even in champ select, we actually learned and picked up a couple of things in-game as well, starting from the beginning. And we will use those things that we learned in the upcoming matches in order to get out of groups.

We’ve seen a lot of champions in the top lane. Specifically, we’ve seen Aatrox and Gwen. But today you picked the Gragas. Why do you think Gragas is so strong?

You can play him AP, you can build him as a tank and he’s usually pretty good into most champions, and I feel comfortable on Gragas as well.

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So when I talk to your teammate, Farfetch, he told me that you guys have had experience from last year playing against PSG and RED Canids and now you face the LPL representatives. What do you think about the teams in your group and how will you be able to use your strength as a team to take them down and hopefully make it out of the group stage?

Well, we knew that RNG was extremely strong and we saw that in the match as well. We knew that the game was going to be this way. But after RNG, we see ourselves as the strongest group, and using our team synergy we believe that we are a much better team and using our team synergy we will be able to take down the other two opponents and we will we think we will get out of play-ins.

You play against RED Canids tomorrow. Do you have any thoughts about them heading into the game?

We didn’t expect to lose against RED Canids twice in the previous year. We really weren’t expecting that. But we are trying to take our revenge and beat them pretty heavily and show that through the stronger region.

So one of the other things about these international tournaments is you get to see a lot of international talent and I know you probably think you are one of the strongest top laners there but I want to also know in your opinion, who else do you think are strong top laners in the tournament?

Well, I do I believe that T1’s top laner Zeus and RNG’s top laner Bin are the two strongest top laners in the tournament. And playing against Bin basically confirmed my belief in him as well.

Is there any team that you are looking to face off against?

I would like to face off against either EG or G2 because I believe that those are the two teams that are closer to our level. We have a higher chance of beating our opponents if they are our opponents.

I know that there’s a lot of pressure, especially from last year’s performance as the TCL representatives. What will you do to make sure that you don’t repeat the mistakes from last year and hopefully make it out of the group?

We didn’t have any international stage experience in the previous year. And that was the biggest factor in having a poor performance. Now we have more experience and we will use that experience to basically get much better performance this year.

Finally, I’d like to know is there anything you’d like to say to the fans of the TCL who are reading Gamelevate’s articles and those fans all over the world?

Don’t be sad because we lost to RNG. We still have a lot of matches to play. So don’t lose faith in us. We are basically the region of comebacks, and we will be much stronger in the next few days.