G2 Esports vs Invictus Gaming – LoL World Championship 2018 Semi-Finals

The semi-finals stage of the League of Legends World Championship is about to begin and we just can’t wait to see the best teams in the world in action. Invictus Gaming, Fnatic, Cloud9, and G2 Esports will give their all to be crowned champions of LoL World Championship 2018 and, without a doubt, will give us another week of the best competitive League of Legends.

The reason we have picked this match for is that it is the battle of dark horses against the kings of China. G2 have been an unstoppable force. They were predicted to be eliminated early in the competition, but they are in the last four and have eliminated arguably the strongest team of the competition a week ago. They are up against another Chinese side, Invictus Gaming, who are the 2nd favorites after RNG to lift the trophy. Will they fall to G2 or will they silence them to go to the grand final? Let’s see.

G2 Esports

G2 Esports has been able to play around its own strength through an uncontested attitude that deserves admiration. The remarkable solidarity lineup of the team, as well as this thirst for initiatives, have shattered the ambitions of RNG. They have silenced all of their critics in a few hours.

For G2, the Royal Never Give Up quarter-final test was supposed to be a painful test, both in lane management and in team fights. The second-place finish in Group A demonstrated their inconsistency at the beginning of these Worlds, as they were able to overtake Flash Wolves but got defeated by low tier teams. The confrontation with RNG at the quarterfinals of the competition was the biggest test of the team in this season. G2 was against a team that has won everything this year and established itself as a model of consistency, which has some of the most reliable players on the circuit and who know how to capitalize on the slightest advantage, but roles reversed on the encounter.

G2 Esports capitalizing on RNG

Royal Never Give Up was unrecognizable. The first observation that comes up from this confrontation is the way in which the Chinese showed no respect for their European opponents. The drafting stages betrayed the Chinese, once again in this tournament, the little respect granted to the Western team was enough to get G2 the victory. In addition to offering G2 the opportunity to evolve in a certain comfort zone during the game, RNG seemed like they had no clue of the meta and weren’t even a shadow of the form they displayed all year long. Lack of synergy between lanes and no communication between the players was evident in this game. Uzi on Lucian was struggling to evolve in team fights for the lack of range and scaling.

The state of the art performance at the highest level is alarming in these world championships and the West is perhaps the only region to have carried out such mind-blowing results. This exceptional work by G2 has taken the best team in the world by storm. G2 Esports knew how to take advantage of the errors of RNG and even if the future of the Europeans in the final tree is uncertain, this success will bring them a lot in the long run, in addition to writing a beautiful page of History.

Invictus Gaming

The world has its eyes on the Western teams that have surprised a dominant force of Asia, but it is forgetting a power that can turn out to be the great winner of the tournament.

Invictus Gaming is a team of Chinese origin that was created in 2011; From season 1 of the League, the organization has been an active participant. Since the first season, Invictus Gaming achieved decent results. After being founded by Wang Si-Cong, son of the third most successful billionaire in China according to Forbes, the team managed to qualify to World Electronic Sports Games after defeating WE to represent their nation, although it fell short in quarterfinals against the North American team Counter Logic Gaming.

For the second season, their performance led them to qualify for different Intel Extreme Masters competition around the world, but the denial of visas to their players did not allow them to travel. Their next pro appearance came after qualifying to the second Worlds in 2012, for which they would travel to Los Angeles. They ended their participation in the quarterfinals after falling against the Russian superpower Moscow Five.

After this, they had a series of bad performances in almost every competition they played in and weren’t able to qualify for the Worlds of 2013 and 2014. For the 2015 season, Rookie, current midlaner of the team, was added to the lineup. In that year, they arrived in the competition too but ended up finishing 2-4 in the group stage. Fate wasn’t on their side in the 2016 and 2017 season.

What changed for iG in 2018?

In the last season, the team composed of Duke, TheShy, Ning, Rookie, JackeyLove, Baolan and West achieved a string of perfect results. The lineup went on a winning streak to reach the top of the table. In the regular summer phase of the League of Legends Pro League (LPL), they reached the first place, while in the playoffs they came on the second place, falling to Royal Never Give Up.

From a personal appreciation, the turning point in the team is JackeyLove. If you followed this team this year then you will have noticed that the player had an MVP performance in almost every game he has played. The prodigy has great positioning awareness, a quick response to attacks and, especially, a thirst for kills, but will it be enough to get this team a much-needed victory?

Final verdict

For the semifinals, they will have to face the unpredictable side of G2, in a match that no one would like to predict. Can Invictus maintain the crown in Asia or will it fall behind in the final instances?

So far, day one of the quarter-finals was exciting where we got full series to watch. Both the teams are in good shape especially G2 Esports which should be feeling confident after taking down the potential number #1 contender for Worlds 2018, RNG. Although G2 Esports did struggle in the group stages, they are right back on the track at the main stage.

However, they do need to look out for Invictus Gaming. Playing against all the odds, Invictus Gaming pulled out ahead of Kt Rolster and won the series with a close margin. In other words, the series between G2 Esports and Invictus Gaming will be a close match-up with G2 Esports having a slight advantage over their opponents in terms of draft and playstyle. So, I would prefer G2 Esports here to take the series from the hands of Invictus Gaming and advance to the Grand Finals of LoL World Championship Series 2018.

G2 Esports 3 – 2 Invictus Gaming

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