LoL – Worlds 2021 Quarterfinals Recap

The quarterfinals are over, and the top eight teams have been halved. We only have four teams remaining, and the time to claim the Summoner’s Cup draws nearer and nearer. We take a look at the past four best of fives and look at the ones that are about to come. 

T1 vs HLE

There really isn’t much to say about this match. Hanwha Life Esports was able to make it into the quarterfinals with rather unconventional team compositions, leaning into their individuals’ laning prowess and slowly expanding on those leads. T1, on the other hand, had a more cohesive look, snowballing early leads from proactive early game plays by moving their jungler and support around the map. 

The first game was rather competitive, with HLE bringing out a Zoe for the mid lane and Irelia in the top lane. However, T1 put together a cohesive team fight composition, with the highly-contested Graves for the top lane, an Orianna for the mid lane, and an Aphelios for the bottom lane. This did not work for the LCK fourth seed, and it seemed like HLE had one idea going into this series and kept doing it over the next two games. T1 seemed to have found HLE out, and each win was more dominant than the last. It was a very quick 3-0, with the LCK third seed not having to expose much. 

EDG vs RNG

This was the only series of the bunch that was not a 3-0.

This all-LPL matchup was a hard-fought best of five between the two teams, but in the end the series became about Royal Never Give Up’s perceived weakness– their mid laner, Yuan “Cryin” Cheng-Wei’s champion pool. Despite being a Mid-Season Invitational Champion earlier this year, he is of help to his team only when he plays utility mid laners like Twisted Fate or Galio. This meant that when those were banned, he had nowhere else to go. He brought out the Annie pick, which was last seen in international play in 2015. 

With Cryin’s influence limited, and with the highlight performances by Zhao “Jiejie” Li-Jie on the side of EDG, they were able to find a third win in this series. Edward Gaming finally break their streak of ending their Worlds journey in a quarterfinal loss (in 2017 they did not even make it out of groups). 

Our MSI champions in RNG bow out early, but we find ourselves asking the question: what if they got matched with another team? Would they have made semifinals if they were against, say, Cloud9 or MAD?

DK vs MAD

This series was another 3-0. The first game was a rather clear dominating win from the defending world champions, with Heo “ShowMaker” Su pressing his leads over Marek “Humanoid” Brazda from the first minute of the laning phase. The rest of the team was able to help him spread this lead over to the rest of the map. 

The second game was a bit of a heartbreaker for the European fans– the MAD Lions got a huge early lead through Irfan “Armut” Tukek’s Jayce and Javier Prades “Elyoya” Batalla’s Jarvan IV, but they made a fatal mistake at the Baron pit. Kim “Khan” Dong-ha found the perfect flank on Kennen, and they were able to come back from a great gold deficit.

The third game was rather… unusual. Cho “Beryl” Geon-hee picked Pyke, and the whole of Damwon Kia played a rather loose game. They were so far ahead, with the gold lead accelerated by the Pyke, but gave away some key picks in the mid game. The game looked a bit competitive, until Damwon decided to take the game seriously once again and closed the game out.

Damwon Kia looked unstoppable as they shut out Europe’s last hope, showing that they are truly the favorites to win it all. 

GEN vs C9

Going into this series, due to their valiant group stage effort, a lot of teams were looking at C9 making it to semifinal once again, the first since their 2018 run. However, Gen G vastly improved going into the quarterfinal match. Gwak “Bdd” Bo-seong dominated Luka “Perkz” Perkovic in the middle lane. Even when put behind in the third game, for example, Bdd still had the greater impact. 

In addition, despite Robert “Blaber” Huang’s best efforts, he was simply outclassed by Kim “Clid” Tae-min. Clid’s decisiveness to execute a play and him being clutch in 50/50 smites is a sight to behold. The team as a whole was able to read and respond to most of the plays that Cloud9 were going for. In the end, the burden to outperform was on C9, and they were not able to do that. 

With C9’s elimination with a 0-3 scoreline, Europe and North America did not win even a single game in the bracket stage

The Road Ahead 

With the next semifinals being Edward Gaming vs Gen G, and T1 vs Damwon Kia, it has to be pointed out first that the LCK is having a great year. With three teams in the top four, they are clearly the best region in the world.

EDG vs Gen G may be a bit more difficult to assess. Both teams like to play in the same way, the differences lie in the champions they favor, and the fact that Gen G still make a lot of mistakes in the mid to late game. EDG may be able to punish them, and because of that, they should be seen to have a slight advantage. 

T1 vs DK should be DK-favored, especially since we already saw this best of five at the LCK Summer finals. It should be noted, however, that T1 have grown a lot since then. Perhaps this is where we see the product of their growth.

 

(Header image via Riot Games)