The competition in the League of Legends World Championships moves on to the plush and elegant surroundings of The Chicago Theatre in Chicago following thrilling group stage action in San Francisco. Most of the favourites made it through to the quarterfinals although there were notable upsets, with Albus NoX Luna in particular pulling a surprise.
The first quarterfinal match-up pits the winner of Group D, Korea’s Samsung Galaxy, against the second seed of Group B, North America’s Cloud9. After conquering the group of death, Samsung are the heavy favourites, especially after their stellar second week of competition during the group stage. The match-up to watch is in the mid lane, with Samsung’s mechanically gifted Crown squaring off against Cloud9’s aggressive catalyst, Jensen.
While Jungler intervention is expected, Jensen will have to create an advantage mid lane for Cloud9 to have any shot of taking home the victory. The pick and ban phase will also be crucial in this match-up. With strong champions Syndra and Nidalee more than likely being 100% banned, it will be interesting to see if Crown can get his hands on his Viktor, or conversely Meteos on his Zac.
The second match-up is between reigning World Champions Korea’s SK Telecom T1 and China’s Royal Never Give Up. While SKT enter as favourites, a team with such incredible talent as RNG can never be discounted. RNG arguably have the most talented roster on paper and we saw flashes of that in the group stage, with Mata’s Alistar against TSM being a prime example. If RNG can harness their collective skill, during a singular best-of-five series they have a real shot of winning.
As per usual for SKT, it all comes down to whether or not Blank or Bengi can give them anything positive from the jungle. If neither Jungler can get anything going, both Mid Laner Faker and AD Carry Bang will have the weight put on them to carry. With two of the three best ADCs in the world in this clash, look for an action-packed bottom lane centered around the incredible play of both Bang and Uzi.
The third best-of-five series sees two tournament favourites colliding, with Korea’s ROX Tigers facing China’s EDward Gaming. Arguably the biggest mismatch in all of Worlds this year will occur in the top lane, with the best player in the world, ROX’s Smeb, fighting toe-to-toe with perennial underperformer Mouse of EDG. EDG’s loss to International Wildcard INTZ was predicated on completely destroying Mouse, a strategy ROX will surely employ. With EDG’s quality bot lane duo of Deft and Meiko, Jungler Clearlove is put into an interesting position of either protecting the team’s weak top lane or helping snowball their best asset. This shapes up as a colossal match, with many predicting an incredibly close five game series.
Last but not least is Europe’s H2k taking on surprise quarterfinalists International Wildcard Albus NoX Luna. Both teams are incredibly happy with this draw, as each were seen as the weakest of the first and second seeds. While in the long run this could cause a sub-par match-up in the semifinals, for now an exciting and close quarterfinal awaits as both teams look to improve upon their impressive group stage performances.
For H2k, FORG1VEN is the player they’ll look towards in order to carry them to the semifinals with his incredible mechanical prowess and ability to avoid death (he has experienced just one death in his previous four matches).
Albus NoX Luna present a difficult challenge for H2K’s coach Pr0lly as Likkrit’s Support Brand is a must ban, with Kira’s mid lane Anivia being in a similar position. Meanwhile, Albus NoX will have to fight some off the rift issues in order to defeat H2k, with both Jungler PvPStejos and Support Likkrit currently battling illness.
It all sets up as a fascinating foursome of action, particularly the match-up between ROX Tigers and EDG, which may well be a title decider in the long-run as the teams battle for a semifinal place in New York.
Image Credit: http://lol.gamepedia.com/2016_World_Championship
