Some highlights of all the action that happened during the second week of EU LCS and the current landscape for teams.
Week 2 of the EU LCS is now firmly in the books and the landscape of Europe has started to become a little more clear. Teams like H2K and Team Vitality are starting to establish themselves as squads to beat while others like GIANTS! Gaming and Splyce are starting to put their issues fully on display. Here are some highlights from the key matches from the past days of competition and an overview of how the teams stack out moving forward in case you missed it.
The good:
FNC vs UOL
In a slow, methodical, and very back-and-forth game, Pierre "Steelback" Medjaldi proved to be too much for his old team Fnatic as his Kalista wreaked havoc in all the team fights. With an incredibly tense ending that echoed shades of Fnatic and Unicorns of Love games from a year ago, Unicorns of Love eventually won out with superior mid-to-late game objective control.
VIT vs OG
With a more fast-paced game, Origen and Team Vitality started the action off with a 51 second first blood and never relented. Origen gained the early advantage and got more than 10 kills on Vitality before the 20 minute mark with smoother map rotations, but Vitality managed to keep it close enough to come back off a few strong team fights and a key catch on Tristan "PowerOfEvil" Schrage in the mid lane.
FNC vs H2K
Despite Marcin "Jankos" Jankowski getting H2K his signature first blood, Fnatic came back twice against the powerhouse H2K off great team fights. The key team fight that ended the game came off a really questionable teleport by Andrei "Odoamne" Pascu who was successfully split-pushing as Fiora on Fnatic's bottom inhibitor.
Both the bad and the ugly:
EL vs GIA
In one of the messiest games of the EU LCS so far, Elements were able to eek out a win against GIANTS Gaming dozens of missed skill shots later. You could definitely feel the frustration felt by all as the game was so drawn out simply due to the inability of all the players to either execute an actual plan or actually land their abilities. GIANTS Mid Laner Isacc "xPePii" Flores looked particularly distraught after the game as his team still looks for their first win.
Standings:
There are 5 teams currently tied for first with 3-1 records: Elements, G2 Esports, Team Vitality, Unicorns of Love, and H2K. It will remain to be seen whether Elements and G2 Esports can stay near the top with much tougher games on their schedule in the coming weeks. As for the other end of the spectrum, GIANTS Gaming alone sits in last place with a winless 0-4 record. It is looking really bleak for GIANTS as they had tough losses in an arguably easier week of competition for them.
Conclusion:
TB;DW, TL;DR:
- Early favorites Origen (1-3) showed a lot of improvement from W1, but still have a lot of issues to work out.
- There will be no repeat 18-0 this split as all the top teams are 3-1.
- The cheese picks are still real with G2's Trick pulling out an Udyr in a losing effort against H2K. Will it continue in Week 3?
- Elements is 3-1 and, yes, this is real life.
- GIANTS looks about as donezo as a team can be with only two weeks of play in.
