It took the whole first week, but on the fourth day of groups, teams finally started properly closing games off of their leads. This change resulted in almost all of the games yesterday being quite decisive and relatively short. Unlike the day before, there were no games where both teams looked horrible.
Here is the recap of the fourth day of the League of Legends World Championships.
Game One: AHQ e-Sports Club vs. INTZ e-Sports
Winner: AHQ e-Sports Club
This game was a perfect example on how to take a lead and push it to a win. After outplaying and killing INTZ’s top lane, AHQ baited INTZ’s mid laner to come top, allowing AHQ to take the mid lane turret at 12 minutes. Add on the pick Liu “Westdoor” Shu-Wei got on INTZ’s ADC, and the Taiwanese team saw themselves with a 4K gold lead at 12 minutes.
AHQ used their gold lead to pressure the map, getting many picks off Westdoor’s Malzahar ultimates. AHQ also used their pressure and better map rotations to take all of INTZ’s inner turret. This led to a 7K gold lead for AHQ at 20 minutes. AHQ continued to use their gold lead to pressure the map, this time taking all of the three inhibitors without much resistance from INTZ.
As INTZ needed to leave at least their ADC in base to clear super minions, AHQ forced a Baron fight. AHQ killed four members of INTZ, took the Baron, and ended the game. After the games yesterday, it was very refreshing to see a team who knew how to close a game with a lead.
Game Two: EDward Gaming vs. H2k-Gaming
Winner: EDward Gaming
This was the match many western fans were waiting for. This match finally let H2K’s Konstantinos-Napoleon “FORG1VEN” Tzortziou test his skills against a top Korean ADC like Kim “Deft” Hyuk-kyu. Like most people thought, both bot lanes played very aggressively from level one. After catching H2K’s bot lane out, Deft was able to get first blood on Oskar “VandeR” Bogdan.
Not discouraged from the death, H2K ganked bot lane, killing EDG’s duo and gifting two kills to FORG1VEN. While both teams were able to get kills and objectives, EDG was slightly ahead of H2K, gathering a 2.5K gold lead by 20 minutes. To H2K’s credit, they staved off EDG for a while by having Yoo “Ryu” Sang-ook split push top lane.
At the 30-minute mark, EDG was finally able to take control of this game by turning around and winning a team fight H2K started. EDG used this team fight win to get Baron. With a 10K gold lead, EDG easily used Baron to close out the game, ending their first week with a 2-1 record.
Game Three: Albus NoX Luna vs. G2 Esports
Winner: Albus NoX Luna
If you would have told me that ANX would end the first week of groups tied for first place, I wouldn’t have believed it. But after their game against G2, ANX looks to have a pretty good shot at getting out of Group A. From start to finish, ANX was in complete control of this game.
After securing first blood for Mykhailo “Kira” Harmash in the mid lane, all of ANX’s members started to pressure their counterparts. There were many instances in the laning phase where ANX’s ADC Vladislav “aMiracle” Scherbyna almost solo killed Jesper “Zven” Svenningsen, who most believe to be the best ADC in Europe. At 24 minutes, ANX snuck a Baron after picking off Luka “PerkZ” Perković. This Baron allowed ANX to take all of G2’s inner turrets, gaining them a 6K gold lead.
After getting a second Baron at 32 minutes, ANX secured the top inhibitor turret, and took the Elder Dragon. With the extra true damage from Elder Dragon, ANX won a team fight at the dragon pit. With only a couple of G2’s members alive, ANX ended the game, thus taking down the first seed from Europe.
Game Four: Counter Logic Gaming vs. ROX Tigers
Winner: Counter Logic Gaming
If there was any team to beat the first seeds of both Europe and Korea, and then lose to a wild card team, it would definitely be CLG. With the return of Aurelion Sol, CLG’s mid laner Choi “Huhi” Jae-hyun finally got to play his signature champion, and boy did he perform. After a creative level one gank in the bot lane to get a kill on Kim “PraY” Jong-in, Huhi proceeded to take over this game.
Huhi, in combination with Zaqueri “Aphromoo” Black’s impressive Alistar engages, allowed CLG to continuously gank bot lane. These repeated ganks resulted in a ton of kills for Huhi. By 20 minutes, Huhi had a scoreline of 7/0/0, and could kill anyone. No matter what the ROX Tigers tried to do, CLG always stopped them.
CLG easily ended the game after they took the Baron, which they used to help destroy the ROX Tigers’ base. Over their three games, it’s become apparent that the ROX Tigers have a horrible early game, which they need to fix in the upcoming week.
Game Five: SK Telecom T1 vs. Flash Wolves
Winner: Flash Wolves
They did it; the Flash Wolves finally closed out a game, and against SKT of all teams. This game started out perfectly for FW. The Taiwanese jungler Hung “Karsa” Hau-Hsuan played extremely aggressive, creating leads for all of his lanes. Karsa single-handedly provided enough pressure for his lanes to take outer turrets. SKT’s jungler Kang “Blank” Sun-gu couldn’t keep up with Karsa, which made Blank look lost for most of this game.
At the 27-minute mark, FW caught out two members of SKT. With SKT having only three members on the map, FW grabbed Baron. FW used the Baron to clear the remaining outer/inner towers. Another pick, this time on Blank at 35 minutes, allowed FW to take yet another Baron. Though with this Baron, FW was only able to take the middle inhibitor turret.
It wasn’t until the 40-minute mark, when FW won a 50/50 smite at Elder Dragon, where they had enough tools to finish the game, and beat SKT. With SKT’s loss to FW, no teams end the first week undefeated.
Game Six: Cloud9 vs. I May
Winner: Cloud9
This was the first game in the tournament where all of C9 looked as if they were all on the same page. William “Meteos” Hartman and Andy “Smoothie” Ta coordinated and roamed top to get their star top laner, Jung “Impact” Eon-yeong, ahead. This lead Impact received allowed him to kill I May’s top laner and jungler in a two-on-one fight in the top lane at 10 minutes.
C9 came into the mid game with a 3K gold lead, as well as having all their players ahead of their Chinese counterparts. C9 used their lead to engage in many different fights againstI May around the map. However, C9 wasn’t able to really get any objectives from it, or grow their gold lead substantially from these scrimmages.
What solidified C9’s win was the Baron they got at the 35 -minute mark, once they took down I May’s Kang “Athena” Ha-woon. The Baron empowered C9 rushed down I May’s base and forcefully ended the game, concluding the first week of the World Championships.
What was your favorite moment from the fourth day of action at Worlds? Let us know by commenting below or tweeting us @GAMURScom.
Photos courtesy of LoL Esports
