After impacting League of Legends on the first two days of the Rumble Stage, G2 Esports had a relatively tough day three. Their first match was to fight PSG Talon and the vengeful RNGs. The victories were necessary to calmly pass the third day, to make sure to be the second worst case of the group, and to potentially avoid the LCK or LPL team in the semi-finals. Unfortunately for European fans, the samurai did not do his duty.
They were beaten in their own country
During the repechage against PSG, both teams seemed to have started with classic formations. As usual, G2 had quite an offensive roster, while their opponents started off with a slightly weaker but better team fight. A brilliant inspiration came to Bay when Caps locked LeBlanc in midfield. The midfielder chooses to face Lisandra, who not only resists LeBlanc but chases him through the turn, even punishing him for being too aggressive. This choice allowed Daniel to lengthen the hat which prevented him from bringing rhythm to the game.
In addition, Juhan was able to use his advantage at the start of the match (Lee Xin viego for Yankos) and put his marks on a very good path. The dominant G2 managed to fight back and even take the lead, but the Southeast Asian players (Taiwan, Hong Kong and South Korea) used their team fights to force the clash. They need a clean win in a 23 minute team fight to regain the lead and end the game in 4 minutes.
Facing RNG, the samurai tried an unprecedented strategy by capturing Yum. Caps and Yankos faced LeBlanc and Viego, but Brockenblade opted to move to Riven, while Flaked picked Ezreal so they could move relatively safely without his team’s support. The European strategy was largely based on BrokenBlade’s ability to get the Bin better. Only RNG took inspiration from PSG and chose Lee Cing in the jungle. This allowed Weiss to keep pace early in the game, and despite G2’s clever responses, his opponents gradually took advantage.
LPL representatives started wearing hats in the mid lane before moving to the bottom lane. They started to clearly dominate the lower part of the map, forcing Yankos to play with him, preventing him from assisting the BrokenBlade Snowball. The Chinese then showed their mastery of the macro and quickly outstripped the Europeans in the snow, who saw their Nexus explode for the second time in one day.
Should we complain?
It is important to remember that losses against RNG or T1 are not particularly embarrassing or unusual. If G2 had shown they could beat these two teams, none of the analysts would say the level difference is too big. As a result, the matches are relatively balanced and the results are uncertain. Also, the Europeans were no fun to the Chinese. If their strategy didn’t work, they wouldn’t be walking around like the lost souls in Summoner’s Rift, because that can happen between two teams of very different levels.
Losing to PSG might be more troublesome, but as Uzim said, Caps and G2 are notorious for their poor performances against less powerful teams. We can add that he has a bad habit of having days when the team is very inspired and shows a completely different look from other days. For some reason, it’s probably best for today to be in the group stage and not in the playoffs. However, the samurai will have to show it differently tomorrow, otherwise the rest of the tournament will be more difficult than expected.
Source : Millenium
