My days at the helm of senior kayaking at WBG

Chapter 166 MSI’s first game against GEN, will the civil war fantasy god WBG reveal its true form?

The advantage of the No. 1 seed graduating from the league and participating in MSI is that you don't have to spend a lot of time to compete in the playoffs.

Weibo is on the list of MSI, and it will participate in the knockout round as soon as it comes up.

Before them, JD.com, the second seed of the LPL, had to participate in the one-week MSI play-in tournament to fight for a spot.

The League of Legends global league has developed to this day, and the Chinese and Korean divisions are far ahead of other divisions.

The third one is some of the more established teams in the European division.

A strong team like Fanatic, which had won the championship before, but later gradually withdrew its investment due to the popularity of some events, results, talent and other issues, resulting in a weak team and gradually falling behind, is also quite inferior compared to the teams in the China and South Korea divisions. Worth mentioning.

Winning a small game is already a blessing, let alone directly winning a bo3 or bo5.

It's 2023, and in the European division of the League of Legends international competition, the team worth worrying about is G2, a team that is quite familiar to LPL audiences.

Other teams, like mad, a lion that originated in Madrid, Spain, have already been beaten into kittens by teams in the LPL and LCK divisions.

After all, as MSI approaches, Riot Games will make major changes to the version, allowing teams to reshuffle their understanding of the version and create more possible event situations.

But after so many years of ups and downs, the investment in LOL e-sports by the China and South Korea divisions has long been beyond what other divisions can match.

Due to the avoidance principle of the same division, two teams in the same division will never meet in the first round of the draw.

2023 is like this, it is not the year of the European and American divisions.

This is definitely the worst draw.

Judging from the posture, this seems to mean that they will compete in the top eight. If Weibo loses by then, JD.com will probably not be able to beat it.

After teams from other divisions lost to JD.com, tweets similar to this sentence were posted about the playoffs.

Jiang Huai is naturally not worried that JD.com will fail in the finals. The reason why he has been paying attention to JD.com's results in the finals is that he hopes that JD.com can show more things in the finals that he has not shown before.

As long as they don't appear in different halves, then the two teams will definitely be fighting each other in the semi-finals - unless someone accidentally loses in the semi-finals.

The audience is also paying attention to which division of the LPL and LCK can win this year's MSI championship.

——"How strong is JD.com? How strong is Weibo, which can defeat JD.com several times?"

Upper half

Zhizi, letme and others, because they are from professional leagues and pay more attention to the event than other anchors, they waited for a long time until they finally got the final lottery list:

But there is no half-zone avoidance principle. In other words, there is still a certain probability that JD.com and Weibo will be drawn together.

The night of the draw lasted until about 9 o'clock in the middle of the night.

GG vs G2
MAD vs T1
Lower half

Finally, on May 2023, 5, the League of Legends MSI play-in tournament officially ended, and the next step was the draw for the knockout round.

If we talk about it then, there will be no chance to continue the fight.

Many people liked it because they also watched the competition between Weibo and JD.com on YouTube.

It is nothing more than to allow some relatively weak competition regions to occupy some positions in the competition by relying on their own talents, or original understanding of the version, so that the trophies will not be monopolized by the two major competition regions of China and South Korea.

Therefore, it is estimated that the semi-finals will probably be a big brawl between China and South Korea.

After losing in the knockout round, you will go to the loser group. The probability of being drawn to Europe and the United States is very high. Then you can directly speed through Europe and the United States to save another chance of resurrection, and return to the semi-finals to continue fighting.

JD.com went crazy in the playoffs. Teams from Vietnam, Japan, North America, and Turkey were all beaten to death when they met JD.com, which made them feel incredible about the strength of the LPL division so far.

From the perspective of the viewing effect, it is not difficult for Jiang Huai to understand why Riot Games did this.

Riot insists on taking them to play in half of the game, but it is just considering the promotion of the game.

C9 vs JDG
WBG vs GEN
It was a bad draw right from the start, and the No. 1 seed met directly.

The two seeds from the four major regions have all successfully qualified for the knockout rounds, which means that they are far ahead of the other wild card regions and will be difficult to surpass.

Therefore, before the start of the MSI knockout rounds, many media have predicted that the LPL will be the most promising region to win the championship.

Simply put, this season is definitely friendly to LPL and LCK teams.

Because the draw ceremony only started after the final two teams in the qualifying round had finished playing, many anchors had already downloaded the broadcast without waiting.

In front of Weibo, Jingdong is really inferior to his younger brother and can't even raise his head. No matter how hard he tries, it is absolutely impossible to win.

When the two teams reach a double defeat, they will definitely meet again, and finally one team will be sent out, which means Weibo will be resurrected and challenged again.

As for how far these four European and American teams can go, not many people really care.

Fortunately, there is a double-elimination format. After losing in the knockout round, the double-elimination format will give you a chance to revive.

Their strength is not strong, anyone with a discerning eye can see that they will definitely not be a match for the two major competitions in China and South Korea.

They may have many skilled players, but their investment limits the development and growth of those players, so the longer they wait, the harder it will be to wait for their spring.

You must know that just three or four years ago, the LPL was far from that scary. Although they had already shown their strength to win the championship at that time, other teams still had some hope of winning them, and it was not as bad as it is now. So desperate.

The remaining teams include GEN and T1 of the LCK, Weibo and JD.com of the LPL, mad and g2 of the lec, and finally GG and c9 of the North American division.

"T1 in the first half of the competition is so happy alone!" said Zhi Zhi. "The second half of the competition is not played by humans at all, and in theory, it is the team that is most likely to defeat T1. Gen has just been transferred. What if the time comes? Isn’t Bo a pure clown when he defeated GEN and never played T1?”

Theoretically, the two teams that might meet in the finals have met in advance in the quarterfinals.

Several clubs watched the draw ceremony in their rented venues.

"Don't say it, really don't say it." Let me think about it carefully, "That's exactly what I mean."

"It feels like this year's MSI is going to be a little crazier. The highlights are ahead of schedule, and the team in the finals must be the strongest. There is no doubt that the gold content is full." Brother Crystal nodded and said.

There is no game of higher quality than the China-South Korea war. As long as China and South Korea meet in the early stage and finish everything that needs to be fought, then in the finals it will definitely be the most high-quality, most trump-card war between China and South Korea.

"It's so exciting."

The audience was delighted.

In fact, this lottery ceremony has always been divided into two types of audiences. One way is to think that drawing a good lottery will allow your team to defeat a weak team and directly send fans of the home team with a higher ranking.

Another way is to think that if you draw a bad lottery, you can watch a more exciting game in advance. In this case, you can give Team Blaster a try, and whoever loses will get out first and no one will do anything.

The funniest thing is that he apparently drew a good pick, but after a long period of trouble, his team couldn't beat the weak team with a good draw.

It is equivalent to Taobo losing to Vietnam, and RNG losing to G2.

Pure show effect and comedy.

It was obviously good enough on paper, but before the audience had time to buy tickets to watch their own team compete, they learned the good news in advance that the team was eliminated.

Who in the right mind buys tickets for LPL, European and American divisions and wild card games?
Not to mention going to see it live, I even heard about it on my phone and didn’t even bother to open it.

On the one hand, it was uninteresting, and on the other hand, I didn’t think it was going to be an exciting match at all. As a result, we lost inexplicably in the end, which made fans on both sides very embarrassed.

"It's good to come up and play in the LCK. This way we can test whether Weibo is a strong team."

"Weibo has only been established for two years, how can it be a strong team?"

"Last year's championship was entirely due to Jiang Huai's personal talent. Did he pick up the version?"

"Last year's version was completely inexplicable. The final was a decisive battle between DRX and Weibo. I always thought it was ridiculous."

"Does Long Cha have any strength? I think he's pretty good at Weibo."

"Longcha still has some strength, but Weibo has come all the way and only beats its own team, which is a bit unjustifiable."

"This MSI can be said to be a serious foreign war, and they will fight gen when they come up."

"I recognize Gen's strength. It just depends on whether Weibo can fight."

"You really think Weibo is awesome, but I think this is a shock wave team."

"Is it possible that he is a civil war phantom god?"

"There is still another chance for resurrection. If you can't beat it, just torture Jingdong again."

"Let me tell you, if the lower bracket really steps on JD.com and then loses to LCK, I will really hate this stupid team to death."

Since winning the title last year was somewhat less valuable, this year's Msi and Weibo will play in the LCK, which is a bit uneasy.

Referring to last year's back-and-forth fight between Weibo and T1, this year Gen has crushed T1 under its feet.

After thinking about it carefully, I feel that Weibo may only be a top four after all.

But this time, the theoretically strongest teams from the two divisions were brought together to reach the quarterfinals, and it would be embarrassing for whoever lost by then.

Not being favored before the start of the game is also a prerequisite for a strong team to win the championship.

Looking at the international competitions of LOL, whoever is favored before the game is more likely to be mentally unbalanced. When the time comes, it will be the most ugly thing to be overturned by a weak team.

Nowadays, Weibo does not have an advantage in public opinion. Jiang Huaifan looked at the various unfavorable things said by fans on the Internet, and he still felt that his team was definitely not weak.

Although he has never played against Korean teams several times, Jiang Huai also doesn’t have much experience. When playing T1, he only noticed their vision suppression, which was very scary, but he really didn’t realize the rest. Something, but Jiang Huai will not lose confidence.

We can only rely on Danny's experience in training matches.

Being born in LCK, he can definitely bring some more targeted training experience to Weibo.

It's just that when Danny heard that Gen was going to be beaten in the first round of the knockout round, he seemed to be a little unbalanced and couldn't help but say Xiba.

"How are you going to fight this Xiba? How come you're so powerful at the beginning!"

A little thought from the coach.

I don't know if it's because he doesn't know how to fight, or because he's just not ready, but Danny's crotch-stretching performance still somewhat surprised Weibo.

The preparations for the training match began, and Danny looked serious, making it hard to tell whether he had something. In short, during the training match, he practiced a lot of lineups that he had never practiced before.

Judging from Jiang Huai's perception, Danny mostly trained them with relatively stable lineups and tactics, and they should still be a little unsure. Otherwise, Danny wouldn't be as confident as he is now.

After all, it’s still gen!
Theoretically the strongest team in the LCK, no matter how arrogant the Korean coaches are, they still have to give face to the LCK's top brother.

After training hard for several days, the day finally arrived.

The day before the upcoming game, Chovy went to eat seafood with his teammates.

Although they don't know the Weibo team, judging from Weibo's performance last year, Weibo's strength should not be that exaggerated.

You still need to relax as much as you should. After training, they are still very humane.

And what Chovy, a player, hates the most is being nervous before a game. When he is nervous, his operation is easily deformed, so every time before an important game, he will make a special effort to relax mentally. Only in this way can he exert 120% of his strength. .

Judging from the recording of the pre-game documentary, Chovy was sitting in the lounge, doing head gymnastics, and greeting fans in front of the camera. It seems that he was indeed relaxing.

But LPL viewers felt that the way he shook his head seemed a bit like he was imitating LPL's Leyan Lege.

——"Smiley face".

LPL audience evaluation.

On the other hand, Weibo started a tough battle, which inevitably made everyone on their side feel a little solemn. They didn't know if they could win. They were more concerned about whether they could advance to the next round, but it was hard to see any smiles on their faces. .

Prince Ning was quite nervous.

Among the entire team, he may be the one who has been furthest away from the competition.

Since entering the World Championship in 19, he has not experienced this kind of atmosphere from a competition for a long time.

I was very nervous and raised a V-sign when greeting me, and was scolded by the audience for being "maliciously cute".

"Have you already started competing before you win? Uzi also wanted to laugh when he saw King Ning like this in his live broadcast room. "I don't know why, but I just want to laugh when I look at him. Ning is a real person. It's quite funny and has a good program effect. "

No one knows how Ning Wang is feeling now. Only those who often watch his games know that after taking the stage and sitting in the game seat, he has such a solemn expression, which is rare compared to the past.

(End of this chapter)