Lukas "gla1ve" Rossander is the in-game leader of Astralis and one of only a handful of players who have won a CS:GO Major. Ahead of his games at the ELEAGUE Premier playoffs, gla1ve took the time to answer questions from theScore esports about the ongoing Danish rivalry and maintaining form within the team.

2017 has been a rock solid year for you guys overall, but, more recently, there seemed to be a noticeable slump after the Kraków Major. Astralis only finished in the quarters at Malmö and had a group stage exit at New York.

In an interview with HLTV, Nicolai "dev1ce" Reedtz has blamed this on individual performance, but what’s your take on the situation?

The competition is fierce and there are quite a few really good teams out there. After reaching the semis in 10 tournaments straight, we've had a period where things didn't go just as well and I think it's a combination of the team effort and maybe some fatigue.

We all had to dig deep over the summer and I feel we've been able to turn it around and we all got the hunger back. Let's see in six months time, but I feel really good about the team and our performance as individuals these days!

You guys have made a recovery with your performance in the ELEAGUE Premier Group D, was this due to a change in game plan since your previous two events? How much of a factor was your team’s so called Performance Optimization Model?

Astralis has always worked towards becoming better by preparing, working hard and improving the details. By introducing the model together with RFRSH, we're able to improve on all the little things around us.

And even though you can't say that this or that specific element has given us a specific benefit, there is no doubt that the structure, the attention to detail, the measuring and the organization around us does help us to improve and handle a slump, as you call it.

Given these new or out-of-game training methods, do you find it more difficult to put in enough hours in-game?

It's a balance.

As players we are not forced to do anything we do not feel helps us in that respect, but of course we're spending time on partners, content and PR that we didn't used to. I do feel we're good at maintaining a healthy balance though.

Where do you believe you guys stand in the “Danish Rivalry” with North, Heroic and to some extent FaZe with karrigan?

Only history and results can be the judge of that, but there is no doubt it will be a big part of playing in Copenhagen at the BLAST Pro Series, where we will be playing North and FaZe in front of 10,000 crazy fans.

I think we have proven that in 2017 we have had the upper hand, but we have to work extremely hard to maintain that position.

I believe that the current state we are in right now is the state most teams only get to after doing a roster change. Together with our sports psychologist we have been working with some things to get to this point and it is so cool to see it working.

The team has refreshed energy and a new look on things and we will do everything to maintain this.

What’s your opinion on the changes Valve has introduced to pistols and unarmored aim punch? How has this affected your game plan going forward?

I'm not sure what I feel about the changes to pistols. I believe it was necessary to change something, but right now you don't know if they are done with updating the pistols, so it is tough to say if I will like it or not.

We all love playing CS:GO and the updates have changed the meta. This is fun for the teams and players to learn and work on new things. After all, it is important to listen to the CS:GO community and update the game on a regular basis.

You’ve mentioned you’re a fan of Danish rap, what would be the one song you’d recommend for people looking to discover it?

My good friend made this one, and I really like it:

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.