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Paris Saint-Germain's Rapid Rocket League Rise
The storied soccer club has one of the most exciting Rocket League teams today — and they're gearing up for ELEAGUE.
We've seen several noteworthy organizations snatch up Rocket League teams over the last few months, from Team EnVy to Cloud9 and Fnatic. But Paris Saint-Germain is a one-of-a-kind organization in Rocket League's competitive scene: they're also a real-life French soccer organization, which was founded in 1970 and is one of the most popular clubs in the world.
On the other hand, PSG's Rocket League team has only been together for a few months now, emerging during the Rocket League Championship Series offseason to rapidly take the talent-packed European pro scene by storm. But they've already made a huge impact on the RLCS, becoming the first team to ever notch a 6-0 record to start league play and ending up 5th-6th at this month's World Championship.
This weekend, they're back in America to face off in The ELEAGUE Cup: Rocket League, which brings the top 8 RLCS teams back for another weekend of high-level play — and $150,000 on the line. We spoke with the team during the RLCS finals to learn about how this squad came together, playing for PSG, and what makes them such a dynamic trio.
The unexpected free agent
Last season, Victor "Ferra" Francal made a big splash in the league as a rookie member of The Leftovers, the EU team that banded together at the last minute and surged during league play. In the very first week of season three league play, Ferra notched a wild goal (below) that found him faking out members of FlipSid3 Tactics, the reigning champions at the time, and it immediately cemented him as a rookie to watch.
When we spoke with the team back in May, just before the World Championship, captain Nicolai "Snaski" Andersen suggested that the less-experienced Ferra wasn't yet a fully-rounded player, but that he had plenty of raw offensive talent. "We didn't really know what to expect of Ferra going into it, but it turns out that he just scores goals regardless of if he's playing bad or good," said Snaski.
The Leftovers landed in 4th place for the season at the World Championship, and as far as Ferra was concerned, all was well with the team afterwards. He said he was grinding out ranked matches and waiting for the X Games Invitational in July — but when Snaski returned from a post-RLCS vacation, Ferra found out that he had gone from a Leftover to left out of his team.
According to Ferra, just two weeks before the X Games approached, Snaski told him that he and teammate Alexander "Sikii" Karelin had decided to try out other third players in place of Ferra, given the ongoing roster shuffle and availability of experienced EU players. He said the news came as a total surprise to him. "I didn't know any of that before [Snaski] actually told me, because I was expecting to keep playing with them," recalled Ferra at this season's RLCS World Championship.
His account matches up with what Snaski told us back at X Games: "We just told [Ferra] that we wanted to try out other options, and he was obviously free to try out other options as well," Snaski explained. "But he got a bit upset and told us that he wanted to leave, so he left." The Leftovers instead brought Kasper "Pwndx" Nielsen to X Games over Ferra, but didn't commit to him being a permanent member. Ultimately, former EnVyUs/Northern Gaming player Nicolai "Maestro" Bang had the job by the end of the summer.
Building a team
Ferra had gone from a relative unknown to a strong European RLCS player to a free agent in the span of just a few months — but he was undeterred, and committed to finding a new team for season four. "I was a bit disappointed, but I think I bounced back," he recalled with a laugh at finals.
He soon paired up with Thibault "Chausette45" Grzesiak, a fellow French player who had played with Gale Force Esports during their disappointing season three run. After the season, Gale Force decided to rebuild around Jos "ViolentPanda" Van Meurs as captain, and they then went on to win the RLCS World Championship earlier this month. However, Chausette45 said it wasn't a great environment for him back when he was still with the organization.
"The difference between last season and this season is in this team: the atmosphere is better," said Chausette45 via a translator, further suggesting that his previous roster lacked synergy together. "Now I can show my skills. Last season, the team atmosphere was bad and I could not focus on my game."
As the new RLCS season approached, they tried out a few unsigned third players and found the most success with Daniel "Bluey" Bluett, a 15-year-old English player on the rise. His previous squad, Team Infused, fell short during season three qualifiers. "[Bluey] had a few options, but he decided to go with us," said Ferra.
Good decision. Much like Chausette45, Bluey really had a chance to shine this season, putting up amazing aerial shots on a regular basis. He's been pegged as the EU equivalent of Cloud9's Mariano "SquishyMuffinz" Arruda, a mechanical master who routinely knocks out insane shots and never breaks a sweat doing so. We've already seen strong flashes of that kind of brilliance from Bluey during his short span playing at the RLCS level.
And the young star-in-the-making, who was ineligible to play in the RLCS before season three due to his age, is thrilled to now have this opportunity. "It feels great," said Bluey. "I feel like I should be here and I'm feel like I'm showing that, and […] we're doing really great. I'm happy."
From Frontline to PSG
As Frontline, the trio came out swinging during the European play-in tournament for this season, and quickly delivered a statement win that put them on the RLCS radar. As fate would have it, their opponent was The Leftovers.
Frontline swept The Leftovers 3-0 to secure a spot in RLCS league play, offering Ferra the kind of public catharsis that he probably didn't expect to find so suddenly. He tweeted that it was "ironic" and "meaningful" for him, and ultimately, The Leftovers lost again later in the day to fall into the Rival Series for the season. Ferra's old team shunned him and fell out of the RLCS, but he had gone on to build and captain a brand new contender.
"It felt great," he said about showing up his old teammates with the win. "I think I was just excited to prove that it was a bad decision. I don't know, usually I kind of get nervous, but this time I was just excited. I think I showed it."
While it was a key moment for Ferra in the grand storyline of competitive Rocket League, it was more importantly a bold coming-out party for Frontline in the pro scene. Bluey and the 16-year-old Chausette45 were young stars who hadn't yet shown off the extent of their abilities at the highest level, and the play-in tournament offered just a taste of what we would soon see during the regular season.
After Frontline's blistering 4-0 start for the season, Paris Saint-Germain eSports announced that it had acquired the team. Founded in October 2016, PSG's gaming wing had fielded a League of Legends team for a year and also pro FIFA players — and like the latter, the addition of a professional Rocket League team made a lot of thematic sense for the club. Frontline had offers from other organizations, but there was added value for the two French players in signing with PSG.
"It means a lot, especially for Chausette and I, because we're French and we know what PSG — what the name means in France," explained Ferra. "It's one of the most popular football clubs in France, and one of the most popular in the world. For us to represent this name… it just feels good."
Late-season stumbles
Ultimately, PSG eSports would go on to notch six straight wins in league play, including taking down fellow 5-0 team Method to secure the last of those victories in week four. And then they stumbled. PSG lost their final game of the regular season to EnVyUs, the previous season's champions who had turned in a woeful 1-5 performance to that point.
Bluey and Chausette45 had become known for wonderfully over-the-top goals, but it looked like they were trying too hard to make highlight-reel plays happen during their big moment atop the standings. Ferra affirmed that the team hadn't gone into the match with "the right mindset." The following week, in the EU Regional Championship, PSG lost 4-1 to Gale Force and then fell to Mock-It 4-3 to finish 4th in the region. All told, it was a rude awakening for a team that had been nearly untouchable for their first few weeks in the RLCS spotlight.
"We were 6-0 and we just had too much confidence," said Bluey about their sudden slide. "We were doing things we usually wouldn't. Too much confidence."
It seemed like very bad timing for the team to lose its successful swagger mere weeks before the World Championship. But they had another opportunity to turn it around: last month's Northern Arena Rocket League Invitational in Toronto. PSG fought their way through Gale Force, beat NRG twice, and found themselves in the Grand Finals against Cloud9. The NA favorites had already defeated PSG once in the tournament, so PSG would have to force a bracket reset and win two consecutive series to take the NARLI championship.
That didn't happen — but PSG won the first grand finals series against the usually dominant Cloud9, and the ultimate second-place finish amidst a stack of international teams gave them the confidence that had gone missing in recent weeks.
Chausette, Bluey, and Ferra (from left) also won ESL's France Championship
© ESL
"Seeing as we lost the last game of league play and didn't do anything in the regionals, coming in second at the Northern Arena tournament was really good. It showed that we are one of the top teams, even after we had that little time when we played really bad," affirmed Bluey. "We came back and it felt really good. We sorted all of our problems out, figured everything out, talked about everything, and we came back."
The PSG way
At the RLCS World Championship, we saw a rejuvenated PSG that played much closer to their potential, and up to the level we saw in the early weeks of league play. They blew through Oceania's Pale Horse Esports in a 3-0 sweep before taking down Cloud9 in a surprise 3-2 win, with the final game stretching more than four minutes into overtime. Unfortunately for PSG, they came up short in a close battle against Method, losing 3-2, and then were knocked out of the tournament by G2 (3-1).
Finishing 5th-6th puts them in the middle of the pack amongst World Championship teams, but it still cements Paris Saint-Germain as one of the top overall teams today — especially in the stacked European region, where they are a strong #3 team right now. They're a squad still in search of consistency, as the up-and-down pattern showed, but when they are truly hot they can seemingly take down any other team out there.
What's the key to their success? Well, Bluey and Chausette45 are both show-stopping offensive players — and they know it. Ferra knows that too, and his willingness to be both the backstop and cleanup man is the reason why their dynamic often works so wonderfully. He's more than capable on his own, but he lets his flashier teammates lead the charge and try to take opponents by surprise.
"Me and Chausette are quite mechanical players, so we can do a lot of things that other players can't, and we have Ferra in the back being a more defensive player. He's kind of like making up for our mistakes and cleaning up," said Bluey. Added Ferra: "We have two of the fanciest players in the league. We kind of do unexpected stuff — we don't have classic rotations, so I guess it's hard to play against us."
PSG earned their spot on the big stage this season
© Psyonix
When we spoke with RLCS caster and analyst Callum "Shogun" Keir in early October about how the playoffs were shaping up, he offered his take on what makes Paris Saint-Germain so deadly — whether they even realized it right off the bat or not.
"It's a team that fits together perfectly, although I'm not sure how well they were aware of it when they formed. There was a lot for each of them to prove, especially for Chausette," said Shogun. "My personal takeaway is that the team works because they know their boundaries and limitations. Why overcommit to a passing play when you have a strong ball carrier in Bluey? The team works because they're not getting caught in bad positions, and instead allowing individual brilliance to flourish."
It's a unique approach, but it's one that has already helped this young team find quick success. And this weekend, they'll have another chance to prove their skills at The ELEAGUE Cup: Rocket League in Atlanta, which finds PSG starting with yet another important matchup against Cloud9. PSG took the win the last time they met up at the RLCS World Championship, but Cloud9 outlasted them in the bracket en route to a third-place finish.
But if their previous battles — and PSG's ever-frenetic play — have taught us anything, it's that we're sure to get an exciting showdown come Friday. And hopefully all weekend, too, as ELEAGUE crowns its first-ever Rocket League champion.
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