FunPlus Phoenix has benched 2020 League of Legends world champion Nuguri, according to a translation of the org’s latest Weibo post by well-known LPL journalist Ran.
In his place, FPX will “temporarily promote” FPX Blaze top laner Ping “xiaolaohu” Xiao-Hu to the org’s starting LPL lineup. The 18-year-old top laner has played well this year in the LDL alongside his team, finishing the 2021 Spring Split with 21 wins and four losses. Even though his team lost in the finals of the playoffs against Young Miracles, xiaolaohu had a strong performance.
While FPX (5-3) got off to a good start to the 2021 LPL Summer Split, they’ve lost their last two best-of-three series against Bilibili Gaming and Invictus Gaming. Nuguri was one of the weaker links in these matches, failing to have a significant impact throughout the series.
With half of the split already gone, FPX is looking to shake up its roster and prepare for the playoffs. But if this experiment is unsuccessful, they could be easily overtaken by other teams that are close behind them in the standings.
FPX’s next match is tomorrow against LGD Gaming (5-4). Although LGD lost their previous match against Royal Never Give Up, they’ve picked up a couple of wins against other top-tier teams. The squad led by former MAD Lions jungler Shad0w has been looking much better compared to the previous split and could be a difficult challenge for FPX to overcome.
LGD and FPX will face off tomorrow, July 9, at 6am CT.
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