Greetings Brokenshard, thanks for accepting this interview! Could you introduce yourself for those who might not know you?

Hi my name is Ram "Brokenshard" Djemal, former LCS player, current LCS coach, full time memer.

Before we touch upon your current team and your recent success I would like to take a step back and talk about the challenger series since you are very experienced in the scene. First of all, how would you reflect on the recent split of the EU challenger series and would you say it was more competitive than the previous one?

Yes I believe it was more competitive, at least towards the playoffs. OG being in the scene was both good and bad. For us, getting smacked silly by them in the spring split taught us how to lane swap effectively and strategize around certain members. I believe having a super team like OG in the CS can actually HELP CS teams learn, since most CS teams won’t have the privilege of scrimming LCS teams, this is the best practice they can get against superior strategy.

In EUCS this split, DNL were our biggest threat, and taking them out early was a huge boon for us. After taking them out, I believe EUCS was not that difficult. However, us slumping and other teams such as G2, Mouz and DNL getting better, the top 4 were insanely close together and it was difficult to figure out who was the best team.

Europe is known as a region with loads of promising young players. Do you think it has the talent to continue growing and produce competitive challenger teams?

Yes I do believe it does. I hope to be involved in developing talent in the EUCS while coaching the LCS team.

As someone who has witnessed the challenger series from its very beginnings, how would you rate the evolution of the challenger series and do you think Riot is taking steps in the right direction?

It’s getting better and better, every season there are definite improvements, but something that's been a step backwards has been BO3's in the 3rd place match and the playoffs not being on LAN like they were last time.

If hypothetically all of Dig.EUs players would fall sick, having to sit out the first half of the split and you had to build a new team out of players not in lcs already, how would the roster look?  

With just players not in the LCS? Assuming SK gets relegated I'd use Wickd, Svenskeren, Fox, Sedrion and Hybrid. If we're using JUST players not in LCS, replace Fox with either Cozq or Perkz and Svenskeren with Kirei or Dan.

How would you describe your current coaching style and how do you think that compares to the others?

Current coaching style is balanced. I don't focus on many things, I do everything and use my analysts to help me. I also did all the duties a regular team manager would do on top of the coaching. Basically I had a very busy split, and my goal was to make the players focus on nothing but playing the game while still providing guidance and strategic input both on drafting and in game strategies.

As the head coach of a team with known analysts like Froskurinn or Razleplasm, which is relatively many in the EU CS. How impactful are analysts in the current state of the challenger series?

The best dynamic I ever worked in was with Frosk. Me and Raz have not yet figured out what dynamic works best for us, but he's incredibly helpful and helped a lot in strengthening the input that I give and vice versa. He assisted me and Waboba in stat collection, bouncing ideas off each other, mid-series adaptations such as in the mouz game, I spoke to him through DM's to figure out if there were any adaptations in his eyes that were necessary, and in keeping track/focus on specific things in games like warding, rotation play, objective control, laning mechanics etc.

Can you describe of dealing with 2 very young but talented players like Sencux & Wunderwear and do you think the age limitation is reasonable?

I feel like it was easier to work with them since I had already played with them. I knew, as a player, what they required from a jungler, and even though as a jungler I was not able to mesh well with Wunder, me and Sencux meshed insanely well. I understood his mindset both in game and out, and helped him adjust it so that he could be a more well rounded player. Same went for Wunder, even if I was not able to deliver from a jungling standpoint, I felt like it was easier to understand his expectations and areas to improve.

It was a lot of fun. They're usually very receptive to coaching and much easier to work with than some other players I’ve worked with, regardless of age.

Now some questions about your current LCS team Dig.Eu: How would you characterise your team in its current state, personally?

Not good enough for playoffs. I don't think in our current state we can COMFORTABLY avoid relegations. A re-energized team, coming into the LCS with better structure, better practice, and then I would feel much more comfortable and confident. I feel like we have a very high ceiling, and it'll be up to me and the players to reach that potential.

Your support player nisbeth had a very solid performance this split. This comes after a disappointing showing on the lcs team meetyourmakers, what do you think led to this improvement and why is he performing better in this team?  

Motivaton. I knew MYM Nisbeth was not the real Nisbeth, Sencux vouched for him heavily, him and Kobbe became a machine-like unit. Insane synergy and became a very strong focal point of our team. I feel like I listen to his input more, and let him decide what he feels comfortable on. 

Did you know his Leona game with MYM was his first EVER Leona game? Yeah i don't make those mistakes..

In light of the upcoming promotion tournament could you characterise Gamers2 and Mousesports and their chances against lcs veterans Gambit and SK?  

Gamers 2 rely a lot on their mid-jungle and jungler-support synergy, which I feel might run into a wall against Fox-Sven and Sven-Noxiak. I am unsure how well Sven and Noxiak will perform together, but Noxiak is without an argument an upgrade over nRated.

Mouz are much much more strategically sound than G2, and I feel like strategical advantages are what they'll need to find over GMB. Cabochard is their main carry, and even though criticized, Betsy is superior to Xioh. It will be up to Dan and his bot lane to find the individual advantages, but Mouz as a team will need to overcome GMB

Going into LCS, what are your expectations for Dig.Eu, how do you think you will place and how do you think your players will hold up at the highest level of play?  

Like earlier, I feel like we have a high ceiling, and we want to take the first split as a training split, and look to be competitive in the summer split.

Thanks for the interview Brokenshard and good luck in the upcoming split!  

Thanks. Shoutout to the fans for sticking with us and to Dignitas's sponsors: alienware, scan, intel, corsair, multiplay, twitch, tp-link, AKracing, alphadraft, KILLER and iiyama.

Dan focuses on the European Challenger Series and you can follow his work at @DanEsports.  You can follow the interview subject at @BrokenshardEUW.

Photo courtesy of Team Dignitas.