CLG has revealed the five players who will be starting for its League of Legends team in the upcoming 2022 LCS season.
The team’s lineup consists of former Team Liquid top laner Jenkins, longtime LCS veteran Contractz in the jungle, former FlyQuest starter Palafox in the mid lane, and the one-time 100 Thieves Academy bottom lane duo of Luger and Poome.
CLG wiped the slate clean this offseason, hiring new coaches and front office staff members to fully clean out the team’s starting lineup. The organization appointed former Golden Guardians assistant general manager Jonathon McDaniel to the position of GM in October, while Thomas “Thinkcard” Slotkin joined as the team’s head coach earlier this month. The team released its entire starting lineup from the 2021 season on Monday, Nov. 15.
This offseason, CLG was one of the only LCS teams to not retain a single starting player from its 2021 squad. Two of the five players from CLG this past season have already found new homes, with WildTurtle set to start for Immortals in 2022 and Finn heading over to the LEC to play for Excel Esports.
After going all-in on veteran talent in 2021, CLG is turning the focus of the team entirely to young, developing players in 2022. Only one player on next season’s CLG roster, Contractz, has more than two years of LCS experience. Luger, an imported player from Turkey’s TCL, has played professional League since 2018 but only played one game in the LCS in his career.
All of CLG’s new starters were brought in from other LCS organizations who had released them earlier in the offseason; CLG did not make any internal promotions from its own Academy-level lineup. Four of the five players who made up CLG’s Academy lineup this season were released by the team earlier this month.
CLG will have the chance to showcase its new starting lineup when the LCS returns to action on Jan. 14 for the 2022 LCS Lock-in tournament.
Correction Nov. 19 12:37pm CT: An earlier version of this article erroneously said PowerOfEvil played for CLG last season. PowerOfEvil played for CLG in 2019 and TSM in 2021. We regret this error.
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