No one expected the Europeans and North Americans to make it this far. After all, G2 Esports was facing Royal Never Give Up, the best Chinese team in the region. Fnatic was facing Edward Gaming, the 2015 Mid-Season Invitational champions and Cloud9 was facing Afreeca Freecs, a prominent Korean team.
The odds were stacked against them…literally. No Western team was expected to make it past the Quarterfinals. In fact, Fnatic wasn’t even projected to take first place yet they did and it was against Invictus Gaming. Now, with Fnatic facing off against Cloud9 and Invictus Gaming facing off against G2 Esports, history is waiting to be made. No matter the outcome, at least one Western team is going to make it to the finals—either Cloud9 or Fnatic.
On the other side, G2 Esports—the giant killer—will face off against Invictus Gaming. If Invictus Gaming makes it past, they’ll be the first Chinese team to make it to the finals after all of their Chinese counterparts were taken out. If G2 Esports makes it and takes down yet another Asian powerhouse, then they’ll make history as the only Western team to take down three major Asian powerhouses on their way to the final. There’s a lot on the line right now for both sides of the draw but no matter what happens, this year is going to be historic.
Cloud9 versus Fnatic, right now, is the most hyped up match right now at the World Championship and this is because both of these teams are known to give rock solid performances when they play. Cloud9 is known as the only North American team that can make it out of Groups Stage time and time again.
Both teams have a strong chance of winning but it’s going to have to come down to the closest of margins. If one team slips up in one of the games, then the other team is going to win the match. That’s how close this match is going to be.
Cloud9 is a scrap team, meaning that they’re willing to try new things and play whatever playstyle needed in order to win. However, unlike the others, they play the playstyle extremely well and strongly no matter the circumstance.
This largely due to the fact that they have the mid laner, Jensen, and the AD Carry, Sneaky, both of who are very adaptable to whatever situation they’re in. Jensen has some of the best mechanical skill in the world right now and Sneaky has some of the best positioning in North America.
In order to win, they’re going to have to prioritize these two players. However, that’s not the only key player right now in Cloud9. One main reason they’ve made it so far is because Svenskeren has been showing up in every single game. Svenskeren is a large make or break jungler, meaning that he can either be really good or he can be really bad and right now, he’s been playing really well. For the first ten minutes, Cloud9 should focus on letting Svenskeren snowball by giving him the safest means to jungle and gank.
By allowing him to do this, Svenskeren should then focus down the Cloud9 top laner, Licorice, andmid laner, Jensen. However, in order to do this, Cloud9’s bot lane duo of Sneaky and Zeyzal are going to need to play safer than usual, especially considering the fact that they’re going up against Fnatic’s main player, Rekkles.
By ganking Jensen, Jensen can easily snowball his lead and then take over the game. Once Jensen has a lead, it’s nearly impossible to stop him unless the enemy team focuses him down. Another reason Svenskeren should also focus down Licorice is because Licorice, like Svenskeren, is a make or break player. We saw Licorice perform extremely well versus Afreeca Freecs. In fact, Licorice was the difference between a victory and a defeat in game three and that’s because he had a strong start and didn’t have any shaky points throughout his game.
If they want to win, they’re going to have to stay away from Fnatic’s main player, Rekkles, and focus down Jensen because if Jensen can snowball, he’ll be able to outperform Caps who, despite his mechanical prowess, cannot match Jensen in a fair fight. To be able to focus Jensen, they’re going to have to give Svenskeren a fair fight in the jungle for the first ten minutes so he can perform the ganks he excels at in the early game. If they can’t do this, then they probably won’t be able to outlast Fnatic and that will be detrimental.
Fnatic has a much stronger lineup in four out of the five positions compared to Cloud9 but this only comes from statistics. In the actual match, it could be a very close head-to-head. After all, Broxah and Svenskeren can play very close on some days but the only reason Broxah is considered better is because Broxah has more consistent of results compared to Svenskeren.
The same goes for Licorice. Even if he can match Bwipo in the lane, Bwipo has shown much better statistics overall. Of course, Rekkles and Hylissang outmatch Sneaky and Zeyzal due to experience and skillset. However, even if all the lanes manage to win in Fnatic’s favor, the one weak link in the entire team is Caps. I’m not saying their mid laner is bad. In fact, Caps has proven time and time again that he can be the most vital piece to Fnatic.
However, he’s going to be facing the toughest part of Cloud9: Jensen. If he fails to meet the competition, then Caps could easily fall and give Jensen a lead which he could use to tear apart the team of Fnatic. As I’ve mentioned before, Cloud9 is a team that can be solo-carried by Jensen at times. If Jensen can get that one kill he needs, he can snowball it into a victory and it’s very hard to shut him down. That being said, the emphasis for Fnatic needs to lie on Broxah and Caps.
Broxah is a consistent jungler and can follow a game plan extremely well. Therefore, his game plan should be to emphasize ganking Caps to make sure that Jensen can’t take over the map through a solo-kill or a gank by Svenskeren. As for Caps, he needs to make sure he doesn’t go for too much, especially considering the fact that he’s going against a veteran of the game. Jensen has been doing this for much longer than Caps has and this will prove to be advantageous for Jensen, meaning he could win the matchup nine times out of ten.
There’s also another piece to Fnatic—their bot lane. The bot lane duo of Rekkles and his support, Hylissang, have proven to both be extremely capable at what they do. Rekkles can take down international superstars like they’re nothing while Hylissang can keep up with the pace that Rekkles needs in order to succeed. They’re most likely going to outmatch Cloud9’s bot lane duo of Sneaky and Zeyzal and, because of this, they should look to play as aggressive as possible. Hylissang should play an aggressive support such as Alistar or Thresh in order to try to secure early kills against the Cloud9 duo.
If they can get Rekkles ahead, then they’re most definitely going to be in a good spot for the mid to late game and this can prove troubling for Cloud9. Therefore, the game plan is to focus down Caps through Broxah while letting Fnatic play an aggressive bot lane. This is their best formula to success and one that could definitely work.
Of the two teams, Fnatic and Cloud9, I think that Fnatic comes out on top for two reasons. On paper, Fnatic’s team is much better and second, Fnatic’s been doing this for much longer than Cloud9. Fnatic’s team has overall stronger players in nearly every role. They have Broxah who’s shown much more consistent results than Svenskeren.
Bwipo has a higher KDA and more champion versatility than Licorice and there’s no doubt that Rekkles and Hylissang outmatch Sneaky and Zeyzal. Furthermore, the fact that this isn’t Fnatic’s first semifinal run says something.
They made two other major semifinal appearances before this year’s: once in Season One and another in Season Five. They have the experience and they know what they need to do to win. Prediction: Cloud9 can put up a good fight but ultimately, I think that Fnatic will come out on top.
Invictus Gaming versus G2 Esports is going to be one for the history books. Invictus Gaming is looking to survive as the last Asian team standing at the World Championship right now while G2 Esports is looking to make history by being the only European team to oust two major Asian powerhouses on their way to a finals appearance.
It’s going to be a game of small margins, just like Fnatic and Cloud9, but it’s going to be an even smaller margin during the team fights. Both G2 Esports and Invictus Gaming have put on exceptional performances with IG taking down top Korean seed, KT Rolster, while G2 Esports performed the upset of the year versus Royal Never Give Up.
With the two teams who made the biggest upsets going against each other, only one can come out in the end. But who will it be? Who will come out as the champion and ascend into the finals. Each will need a game plan to take out the other and they’re going to have to play it as efficient as possible.
Invictus Gaming is a Chinese team, meaning they have a notoriety of skill set and experience backing them. If they want to beat G2 Esports—a team that can use momentum to its maximum effectiveness—they’re going to have to focus down on using the fundamentals of their game.
The reason Gen.G, KT Rolster, Afreeca Freecs, Edward Gaming, and Royal Never Give Up were all taken out was because they underestimated their opponent. Because of this, Gen.G was taken out early in the Groups Stage, KT Rolster was defeated by IG, Afreeca Freecs faced an ousting by Cloud9, and Edward Gaming couldn’t match Fnatic.
Invictus Gaming can’t underestimate G2 Esports because they’re a team that can utilize momentum extremely well and right now, they have a heck of a ton of momentum behind their back after that win over RNG. The fundamentals they need to focus down on are shutting down the momentum early into the game through an aggressive jungler and mid laner and then utilizing their AD Carry, JackeyLove, who played a key role in taking down KT Rolster in the Quarterfinals.
There’s also one more piece to the puzzle which needs to be solved and that’s the use of their mid laner, Rookie. Rookie used to be considered the second best player in the Chinese region to RNG’s Xiaohu, but after RNG’s disappointing performance and Invictus Gaming’s extremely strong gameplay, it’s evident that Rookie could take the number one spot.
Whenever they took down KT Rolster, Rookie literally played out of his mind. Every single game that they won, Rookie had something to do with it. Every time, he outputted either the most or second most amount of damage in every team fight. Like Jensen, if he can get a solo kill early, the mid game is going to go towards KT Rolster. But the thing that separates Rookie from all the other mid laners is that Rookie doesn’t need a kill to get ahead. He just needs to control the lane.
Once he takes control of the lane, then the opposing mid laner will be able to do nothing and from then on, Rookie controls the pace for nearly half the map. In order to win the early to mid game versus G2 Esports, they need to focus IG’s jungler down on the mid lane to make sure that Rookie can control the pace.
That way, if done correctly, Rookie can make sure that they force G2 Esports to play at an uncomfortably fast speed or slow things down if they’re falling behind. Once this is accomplished, they need to make sure that JackeyLove can make it to the mid game because team fights are where JackeyLove—Invictus Gaming’s AD Carry—thrives.
The games which made it to the mid game usually ended at the mid game because JackeyLove can control the fights best in the mid game. During the early game, he’s too weak to make any major moves and during the late game, his aggressive playstyle doesn’t suit well enough to utilize maximum efficiency.
Prioritizing JackeyLove in the mid game will be one of the main keys to winning the game. They did it versus KT Rolster and every match they prioritized JackeyLove as hard as possible led to an eventual win. This is the game strategy need to take down G2 Esports and they need to focus it down to the very bare fundamentals.
G2 Esports is one of the scrappiest teams on the Rift right now but that doesn’t mean they can’t make it work. They’ve done it in the past and they’re doing it right now. Why change? If they want to win, the element of scrappiness is going to have to be their forte.
They need to do the unexpected, especially against a team that has prioritized textbook League of Legends from the start of this year’s World Championship. The keys to making sure this playstyle is committed successfully is putting most of the resources behind Perkz.
Since the formation of G2 Esports, Perkz has been a vital piece to the team’s success. Perkz helped bring them to several EU LCS titles as well as a Mid-Season Invitational final. This year, he could do even more as he was the one major piece as to why they took down the number one team in the world, Royal Never Give Up. They won’t have to do much for G2 Esports’ Perkz except give him the flexibility he desires to make plays around the map. This means that, in one sense, G2 Esports is going to have to play around Perkz, not the other way around.
Furthermore, in team fights, they’re going to need to look towards Hjarnan and Perkz for the main damage. Without these two, they’re not going to get anything done. Furthermore, to be able to make sure that they can keep their momentum in check, they need to make the first objective move.
In order to ensure this, they need to look at Jankos to have an aggressive vision control over the enemy jungler so that he can grab the first dragon whenever they attack. It’s all about the early game for G2 Esports and making sure Perkz can keep G2 Esports afloat. That’s how they win.
Who wins in the end? My say is Invictus Gaming. Despite the fact that G2 Esports is on a roll, we’re forgetting the fact that Invictus Gaming has two of the strongest Chinese players on the scene right now: JackeyLove and Rookie.
Furthermore, G2 Esports can play their scrappy playstyle but if Invictus Gaming play the fundamentals to the best possible form, then there’s no way that G2 Esports will be able to match them into the late game because the scrappiness of their game works best during the early to mid game.
Prediction: Therefore, because Invictus Gaming is good at dragging games to the mid to late game, they’re most likely going to be able to take down G2 Esports in the best of five semifinal match to secure a spot in the finals this year.
Now, it’s only a matter of predicting which team will make it out. Right now, Fnatic seems to have the better chance out of the first semifinal match of them versus Cloud9 while Invictus Gaming will most likely inch past G2 Esports.
The results aren’t set in stone but by the performances being put out by Fnatic and Invictus Gaming, this is very well possible that they’re going to be this year’s finalists. Either way, it’s going to be one historic year for League of Legends.
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