Mid-Season Invitational 2022: Schedule, teams and favourites

The door to Mid-Season Invitational 2022 has opened today, bringing another edition of the annual League of Legends tournament. This year, 11 qualified teams from all competitive regions meet in Busan to fight for $250,000 in prize money. This marks the first time MSI takes place in South Korea.

MSI 2022 schedule and teams 

The Mid-Season Invitational, which usually takes place between LoL spring and summer splits, starts on May 10 and will run until May 29. The tournament will be split into three stages as follows: 

• Group Stage: May 10-15 
• Rumble Stage: May 20-24
• Knockout Stage: May 27-29

For the Group Stage, the 11 participating teams were drawn into three groups. Groups A and B consist of four squads playing best-of-one double round-robin within a group. Group C is comprised of three teams with a quadruple round-robin format. 

Six teams will advance into the double round-robin Rumble Stage, which will be followed by the single-elimination Knockout Stage for the top four. 

Participating teams 

Group A

• DetonatioN FocusMe (LJL, Japan)
• Team Aze (LLA, Latin America)
• T1 (LCK, Korea)
• Saigon Buffalo (VCS, Vietnam)

Group B

• PSG Talon (PCS, Southeast Asia)
• RED Canids (CBLOL, Brazil)
• Royal Never Give Up (LPL, China)
• İstanbul Wildcats (TCL, Turkey)

Group C

• G2 Esports (LEC, Europe)
• Evil Geniuses (LCS, North America)
• ORDER (LCO, Oceania)

The first day of MSI 2022 starts with a clash between Saigon Buffalo and T1 from Group A at 11 a.m. CEST. Viewers can watch the live broadcast of matches on official Riot Games Twitch and YouTube channels, as well as on the League webpage. 

ORDER wildcard — can Oceania succeed? 

The MSI battles are definitely worth watching, as they will surely offer a great portion of top-tier LoL action. There are multiple well-known and persistent teams among favourites, including T1 and RNG who currently dominate their regions. That said, the wild card of this event seems to be team ORDER. The Oceanic squad showed a great performance at the recent LCO Split 1, where they rose from the loser’s bracket to secure the ticket to the Invitational. 

The first matches of Group C should reveal how the team’s strategy is going to work in an international tournament. While they’ve evaded both T1 and RNG in the Group Stage, they will have to overwhelm Evil Geniuses and G2 Esports in order to advance to the next stage

Meanwhile, the LoL community watches closely and makes its own predictions for the event. 

Image credit: Riot Games