Christopher "GeT_RiGhT" Alesund is a rifler for Ninjas in Pyjamas and is one of the most recognized Counter-Strike players in the world. Unfortunately he's been in a slump recently, but he and his team are looking ahead to the SL i-League Season 3 finals to defend their title.

Ahead of his games in Kiev, GeT_RiGhT opened up to theScore esports about this low point in his 10-year career in CS:GO, dealing with his Crohn's disease and the positives in 2017.

What are your initial thoughts about being represented by Orlando John?

I'm super excited to be part of such a big agency. I've known Peter [Peter Strömberg], who is my agent and who is also HeatoN's [Emil "HeatoN" Christensen] agent, and we've been talking about doing something together. We want to move esports further onto a bigger stage, that fits our schedule, and also how we want esports to grow even bigger.

I feel close to the whole agency. They are friendly people, they respect my decisions and I respect theirs. So, exciting times ahead, that's the smallest thing I can say at this moment.

Given the Betway sponsorship and the Orlando John representation, you have bigger responsibilities now, beyond just being on a team and being a competitor. Do you feel added pressure?

Not really, because NiP was built up on us winning, so the only pressure on our shoulders is ourselves, no one else. Not from sponsors, not from organizations and stuff like that, it's purely based on ourselves.

We're not the kind of people who think, "Hey, we can do this," then just go with it and put in good results. We're fighting every day to become better and work with our problems.

So no, it hasn't really affected me personally. The only thing that could have affected me personally is my sickness.

Let's talk about that, your Crohn's disease. For those who may not be familiar with it, what exactly is Crohn's disease?

Crohn's disease is a type of inflammation bowel disease that can affect the parts of the gastrointestinal tract from the mouth to the anus. Very disgusting when you read it out like that, but it is not as disgusting as it sounds.

It's basically a sickness that affects me everyday and every time that I wake up it's a very different day. One day can be good and I have no pain, I'm happy, my medicine has started well. But the next day can be like a living hell or can be just a really bad day in general.

As it affects my stomach system, I need to eat better, have a better sleeping schedule and take my medication — which I've been taking for a few years now — to actually feel good about myself. It can also affect my mood and it can change a lot depending on the day.

It's something I've had for a long time now and it's something I work with every day.

I'm kind of lucky in a way. I've always had stomach pain even 22 years before the judgement saying that I actually have the sickness, but after I became aware I had the sickness, my life has become much better. I know how to control my body much better and how to prevent the pain.

Switching gears. At DreamHack Masters Las Vegas you guys made it to the playoffs, which is pretty solid. But at Katowice, you guys were (pretty unluckily I'd say) eliminated from the group stage, losing 16-14 to both Fnatic and Immortals, and then against Astralis you guys got a quadruple overtime that you guys ended up losing.

Considering all that, it's hard to say that it was a pure performance thing. What are your thoughts from those past two events?

I know that in Vegas we felt a lot of big pressure in general from ourselves because we haven't been performing for a long time, so everyone was playing their hearts out in general. We've been preparing for it, we come up with new ideas and what to do with it and everything like that. So I think in a way we put too much pressure on ourselves.

We know that we're still a solid team, we know we can do decent results, but at the same time I think it got in our mind too much there. We couldn't really perform to a level that we wanted to because we made a mental block for ourselves. I know that we're sometimes, in rounds against Astralis for example on Inferno, we were pretty damn unlucky. But they're the best team in the world, so I can't really say anything more about it.

But then we went into Katowice, we felt much more loosened up, better focused and had a better mentality because we know that we can still do damage.

It could have been a way, way different picture if you ask me. We could have gotten away with the first two wins and maybe gone through the groups, but the group stage there is way different than the other tournaments and it was a hard group and there were a lot of good teams. Unfortunately we weren't one of the teams that performed.

However, I think we felt pretty satisfied in a way, if you can say it like that, because we felt before that we haven't been close to beating any good teams in a long time. This time we saw that we actually have a chance and that we are improving, even though it wasn't a good result.

It still annoys me when I say it, "it's OK," because it isn't, because I want to win, but you have to see the bigger picture. We're fighting with ourselves at the moment to become better and hopefully soon enough we can break out and can win games and tournaments. It just has to take time, if you ask me.

We've been there before, we know how to deal with it and we just hope that our fans can appreciate us a little bit more and support us, even in the dark times.

Talking about some of the things you're saying, such as you guys are, "fighting against yourselves" and the term "mental block." One of the big storylines from the ELEAGUE Major was Astralis and their sports psychologist, is that something that you guys are considering?

We're very open for it at the moment and we're thinking about hiring a person for it, we just need to find someone that understands us. I'm one of the people that's very open to it and I really want to talk to that person to see if they can help my issues on my side of the game.

The best example is take Astralis. They've had, for many years, mental blocks and look where they are now, it looks like a big positive thing. So, we will see in the future about that, I just hope that we find someone that fits into our schedule and timeline.

It's also opened up the conversation on psychologists in the esports scene, because I think a lot of teams or players were kind of, I guess, ignorant on the subject. And the same was sort of the case for player injuries and stretching, but once olofmeister [Olof "olofmeister" Kajbjer Gustafsson] and GuardiaN [Ladislav "GuardiaN" Kovács] got injured, all of a sudden everyone is stretching.

There's the gif of karrigan [Finn "karrigan" Andersen] doing his stretches, his funny voodoo stretches, but I think it's ultimately a good thing.

Karrigan's daily yoga routine😆 A post shared by Håvard Nygaard (@faze_raincs) on Mar 1, 2017 at 9:48am PST

Yeah it is and I think people may underestimate a lot of things because esports is still very new and people are not used to seeing people get injured, burned out, get mental block and stuff like that. Players have thought about it, but they're probably way too afraid to talk about it, because they don't think such things exist. But every one of those things exist and it's been proven over time now.

I think it's a positive thing that people are embracing that they need help with it and that's how it should be. You can be a very strong mental person, but at the same time you can be failing in those big games because you had that small mental block against that player or team. That can be a game changer for that player when it's removed and you can see it on Astralis.

You can see the injuries that's happened with olof, GuardiaN and pyth [Jacob "pyth" Mourujärvi]. No one really talked about it until olof opened up with it, then all of a sudden GuardiaN came up, then pyth had problems later on in the summer.

There's a big issue in the scene, that people are still too afraid to talk about issues and I think people need to open up more. Saying, "Hey, I have this issue, is there someone else that has a similar one?" Then people put up their hands and say, "Yeah, I do," and they can figure out how to deal with it and get help from each other.

RELATED: Astralis' karrigan on GuardiaN and olof's injuries: 'I think they are scared they will come back'

CS is so much bigger than people may think, especially in the close circle of the professional scene. Everyone knows each other very well and talk about a lot of things, so why don't players mention next time if they have a hand injury. karrigan for example, he's doing exercise, so players can get help from him.

Players don't need to be afraid about it, they need to speak their mind because in the long run it's not worth it.

Is it a case where maybe taking a month off of competing, would that be something that could even help?

I think it could, but at the same time I think urge of wanting to play, that will block it in a way. Esports isn't always most friendly work environment or scene, we don't have vacations, we don't have sick days, we don't really have it here yet.

I think people are still too afraid to actually take care of themselves and that's why I think GuardiaN was still playing with pain, then took a long overdue break, then olof took a break when it started to become that bad. I think people need to start listening to themselves, their bodies and actually take care of it.

Do you really want pain for the rest of your life because you didn't take a break? I know the winning mentality, the eagerness to win, the stubbornness. I understand the point of view, but with all due respect to other professional gamers, listen to me.

Take care of yourself, it's serious, don't just laugh about it.

Changing gears again. Your slow start to 2017 and unfortunately not qualifying for the previous Major is maybe a blip in your 10-year career and your five-year stay with NiP. But how does this downturn compare to your other troubling times in your career? Is this maybe the hardest run you've had in CS?

I think this could be one of the biggest battles I've ever had, to be honest. Mostly because there's been other things in my personal life that I don't really want to go into, but it's affected me a lot.

affected me inside of the game, I'm just happy with things has started to become better, motivation haven't been this high in a long time. — Christopher Alesund (@GeT_RiGhTcs) March 1, 2017

There's been problems that I couldn't really do anything about and just had to wait to see what I could do about it. This being also with my sickness as well, so it's not just one thing, it's like ten things and all of them hit me at the same time.

My performance hasn't been going up, it's been slowly and steadily going down, which is something that I'm still ashamed of and something that I work with every day. It's starting to get better now, it's more now about how I hit things nowadays. Going with the right attitude and work with it.

I've been getting a lot of help from a lot of people and also a lot of fans have been contacting me, to support me personally, which has helped me a lot during the tough times.

A lot of people know that I'm a very emotional player, so those who have sent messages during the Major qualifier and before that and now even, I'm very grateful for them. And I'm really sorry that I don't reply to them, I've probably been in a bad mood around that time when I got the messages, but I'm very happy with them. They should know that I've seen it, I've read it.

It's been a tough time, but it's looking promising now, if you ask me.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.