With the exception of UoL, EU teams are just going in rather blindly, do not contest objectives like Dragons and just try to go for Herald/Baron hoping to just swipe them away unscated.
I don't know how the full format of the event is but if at Day 2 we are like that we might aswell declare NA winners from now.
nah FNC will win
Edit: And they won
Their bans....man. Oh? Bjergsen is crushing anyone on Syndra? Let's give him Syndra every game! /facepalm
EU is unfortunately just getting dumpstered by NA right now. Yes we picked up some wins, but definitely did not look good in any of them. NA teams seem to be playing on the same level as they do in the NALCS, and even P1 is stepping up big-time now that they have Xpecial and Mike Yeung. Meanwhile EU seems to be playing a few levels below their EULCS form.
Although Exileh gets destroyed in lane, he can actually support his team really well in mid-to-late game. G2 on the other hand is playing 4v6 throughout the game. Perkz's positioning is so bad he might as well walk straight into the opponent's base. (It also doesn't help that Trick seems to miss every single point-blank cocoon)
A pain to watch indeed.
The way the tournament is set up is a little silly. It doesn't matter what happens in groups as long as whatever team wins the bo5 that region will be declared the winner.
Groups could have literally been a complete shutout and one team from EU would still play in the deciding game vs one team from NA
It is cool to see a weekend of the best teams from both regions going head to head because we almost never get that despite how much people talk about the rivalry but it could have been set up in a way that the group stage matters.
Lol while EU and NA type the Koreans are practicing....
As far as the quality of matches, I wasn't expecting much. That said, EU looked absolutely terrible throughout the group stage, which leads me to believe they just went in blind and are playing for the LULs, not wanting to give away anything in a tournament that ultimately doesn't mean a whole lot. That Xpecial interview was really interesting and sort of confirms why we're seeing what we're seeing. On the flip side, you'd have to wonder just how much losing these kinds of games, as meaningless as they are, affects certain individuals (and maybe even their teams). The former reason might apply more for Fnatic, while the latter to G2, who looked a little frustrated. Still, would not surprise me one bit if UOL smashes TSM in the BO5.
I completely agree.
Even though Fnatic won, it was really hard to watch. Getting caught all the time and winning the game just because of one bad initiation from P1.
It brakes my heart so write this this but so far NA definitely > EU
Personally I feel like Fnatic is just looking predictable now and if you can exploit their midlane they don't really seem to know how to play. Team looks and feels totally overrated to me.
UoL has looked the best to me despite going 0-2 in day 1. Their play when it's on is pretty good and looks decisive.
I'd like to see a NA team ban out the UoL comfort picks. Take away Twitch.Kassasdin, Gnar or what not and make UoL play something that doesn't just scale up. I honestly think they'd lose because they can't play early game well.
