Deft and Zeka take DRX to the knockout stage as chaos ensumes

Top Esports are the best team in the world after they are disqualified, Rogue embraced Europe’s trajectory in week two and we saw a lot of interesting picks.

Rogue almost had the greatest collapse of all time, we finally saw Ashe as a counter to Kalista and get ready for Nasus and Heimerdinger supports ruining your ranked games.

TES lost in devastating fashion 

Every year a Chinese team at Worlds underperforms so massively, they are considered a sacrifice so the other teams can win the entire thing. With three of the last four World Champions being LPL teams, it seems to be working. Unfortunately for TES, it was their turn this year. After a disappointing 1-2 week, TES came into their match against GAM facing an uphill battle. With Rogue securing advancement with their opening win against GAM, TES had to win every single game to force a tie-breaker.

40 minutes into an incredibly entertaining game, TES bot laner Yu “JackeyLove” Wen-Bo stole the Elder Dragon. A base race ensued as the Chinese crowd went wild, but TES came within three auto attacks of winning the game. The entire GAM lineup respawned and ran it down mid, ending the game and the hopes of TES. That was the only game the Vietnamese first seed won in the entire tournament, but it got the job done. TES won the remaining two games in dominant fashion, as questions about the value of sports psychologists arose.

Their jungler Gao “Tian” Tianliang has had a history of mental and psychical health problems caused by stress. On paper, this team had the best roster in the entire group, yet they only showed it after there was no pressure on them. A similar thing happened in the LPL playoffs last year, which might signal a persisting issue. 

Rogue advance to the knockout stage at Worlds 2022

Rogue started the day off on the right note, beating GAM Esports and securing placement in the Knockout stage. But everything that followed suit, was right in line with Europe’s trajectory at this World Championship. The MAD Lions got swept in the Play-In stage, Fnatic and G2 lost every single game in week two and Rogue did their best to match them. Losing every single game on the day apart from the one that turned out to be the most important. European teams went 1-9 in week two, comforting their LCS counterparts who went 0-9 the first week.

We saw a very questionable Nasus support pick combined with two solo laners who do magic damage that can’t capitalize on his armor shred. GAM saw that one fail spectacularly and tried Syndra support against the same DRX bot lane of Ashe and Heimerdinger.

After all of the shenanigans was over, DRX and Rogue were tied with a 4-2 record, heading into a tiebreaker. Despite it being a close game, mid laner Kim “Zeka” Geon-woo put DRX on his back and carried them to the first seed in Group C. His Akali and Sylas performances were much needed and he delivered.

Header: Riot Games