Two korean teams remain and it's none other than 4-time world champions T1, facing their biggest rivals GenG. Last year they only saw eachother once during the swiss stage but this time the stakes could not be higher. Will the returning champions make their way to another title or can GenG make it to finals for their first time ever?
Key Moments
Entering the tournament as LCK's 4th seed T1 has managed to surprise everyone with their perfomance, specially during semifinals proving there's so much we're yet to see from them.
On their game against TES we saw Zeus make an insane escape by staying out of vision with very precise movement and timing. He's been showing incredible knowledge of the map and his abilty to think really fast along making the correct decisions consistently.
This series showed T1's true colors with Keria picking Bard. It may seem simple but the "meta" this Worlds is melee supports, just like last year where they went against the flow and picked ranged supports such as enchanters. This played a huge factor in their tournament victory and seems they're going to do it again. Off-meta does not stop here however as we saw Pyke and Caitlyn picked aswell. There's been some preparation here that's been kept secret for as long as possible.
Talking about Keria, his positioning during teamfights is something every support player should study if they wish to become an insane player. He is tracking all enemy champions perfectly during a fight, ready to disrupt them at a seconds notice taking away any threats against the rest of his team. In Game 2 there were two major moments where not only does he cancel incredibly important enemy spells but takes it upon himself to bait them out to create an engage that's guaranteed to put his whole team at an advantage.
Faker has been ready to follow up on every engage playing a role of facilitator extremely well. He is not the one getting the kills but he's very well carrying these fights.
The whole team has demonstrated the highest degree of patience in their games, they easily identify what fights are good to take or not and play around those. This is a stark contrast from Day 1 of Swiss stage where they definitely jumped the gun multiple times, in this rematch the fights were slowed down as well with many situations where disengaging was the better option even if it meant dropping objectives. Waiting for the right moment is not only an amazing way to win games but they even won against TES without dropping a single kill in a 15-0 stomp.
It's hard to pin point specific moments where GenG has stood out, not because they're not an incredible team but their major strength being Macro and consistent top level laning doesnt make them what people consider a "flashy" team.
Even though they only lost 1 game during Summer season they came into the tournament as the LCK 2nd seed. This remarkable performance carried over to Worlds as they were just so much better than any team they went up against in every regard, even Korea's 1st seed HLE.
Quarterfinals however were a surprise for everybody in the scene as they went 3-2 against FlyQuest. They did win as everybody expected them to, but not only did they lose two matches against NA they almost lost the whole series. Some people may call this a fluke, luck perhaps they underestimated their opponents, doesn't matter what happened; facts are they looked lost these games constantly blundering the whole series.
Team Breakdown
Word out there is T1 has a 20 Loss - 1 Win ratio against GenG in recent scrims similar to how they've been unable to win a single match against them all year long. Interestingly though this is not very disencouraging considering not only their performance during interational tournaments but also this recent series against TES. They're hiding something in that playbook of theirs and I'm confident we'll see the best of it this semifinal.
This team's champion pool is vast and they're not afraid to exploit this. They make their own meta and they come prepared to make it work. Expect to see more ranged supports for Keria and I'm sure Faker has something under his sleeve.
If their performance stays consistent with a patient, methodical approach to the game they might get another World title but they're about to face their biggest battles as only the strongest teams in the world remain. It's up to them not to crack under the pressure during this crucible of war.
I'm hoping that GenG's performance is not in a downwards trend and will bring their top form to the rift this series. We've only seen a fraction of their ability to play scaling compositions and own the map with top level Macro gameplay; if both teams play to their maximum capacity this will be one of the best series in World's history.
This team is like a walking fortress: the strongest of foundations with impeccable laning phase giving no leads away and punishing the smallest of mistakes, strong materials in a super-star roster and probably the best Macro in the world binding everything together.
If allowed to take control of the map T1 may find themselves unable to carry out their plans and forced to make plays happen. Their strongest ability has been patience and it most likely will be tested here; If they don't fight they will meet their destiny.
Predictions
All things considered this will either be the most beautiful games of League of Legends we've seen in a while or a one sided stomp with dreams being crushed swiftly. I've noticed a consistent trend of rematches all throughout this tournament so I'm expecting T1 to be the winners in a 3-2 series.
As always there's a giveaway for the readers! Comment who YOU think will advance to the finals and 70€ in Riot Store Merch will be awarded to someone who guessed correctly.