With the rest of the play-ins group matches rounded up, Legacy Esports ascends to the stage, Mad Lions squeak into playoffs despite bad performances, Team Liquid secures first place and more.
Play-ins groups have come to an end with Day 4 wrapping up and playoffs starting tomorrow. Team Liquid grab first place in Group A while Legacy Esports takes second place. To round the group off, Papara SuperMassive secures third place, and Mad Lions take the fourth and last seed for qualifying to playoffs.
The Meta as of Day 4:
We have seen 69 unique champions being picked in the four days of Play-ins. Champions like Ornn and Orianna have risen in priority with them having 88% and 100% win rate respectively. On the other hand, Lilia has had the most presence in picks and bans but her win rate is only 29% with just 7 picks.
Sett seems to be rising in priority and Ornn has crept up to a must pick or ban state in the current meta. Meanwhile, Ashe’s priority has plummeted as each day of games passes. Orianna still remains a constant force in the meta will keeping a very high presence in picks and bans. Also, Nidalee and Graves remain as the top two most picked jungle champions in the current meta. The playoffs should tell us more about where the meta is headed and how it develops.
Match 1: Papara SuperMassive vs Team Liquid (Team Liquid Wins)
Going into today’s games, Papara SupperMassive and Team Liquid looked like teams on a mission to prove how great they are. This match looked to be the match that decided first place in groups. Papara SuperMassive is a team that plays well with their laning advantages whereas Team Liquid are more of a team play based team.
The game was even at the early phase however Team Liquid was stacking up the dragons. At the 3rd dragon, Papara Supermassive had to fight for it but it went Team Liquids way and they achieved the 3rd dragon with one away from the dragon soul. That started to break the game swing to Team Liquid’s favor which they capitalized on to get a bigger lead and win the game.
Team Liquid was decisive in their play while Papara SuperMassive at the mid-game did not know how to respond to Team Liquid. This put Team Liquid in sole possession of the first place and awaiting their final match versus INTZ. For Papara SuperMassive, they face Legacy Esports where they must win that game to secure second place.
Match 2: Mad Lions vs Legacy Esports (Legacy Esports wins)
Mad Lions have looked underwhelming in their first three games despite winning against INTZ. Legacy Esports however with a record of 1-1 looked at this game as a must-win to secure playoffs. The game was very back and forth in the early stages of the match. Going into the mid-game, Legacy esports have managed to gather up 3 dragons including one dragon steal while the game being relatively even.
As the game went on, Legacy Esports was able to pick the perfect fight with a teleport flank near the baron pit where they got an ace, secured the baron buff, and obtain a good lead. Using that lead, they get the ocean dragon soul and seal the game. Legacy Esports improves to 2-1 while Mad Lions falter to 1-4 and await their fate to qualify for playoffs.
Match 3: INTZ vs Team Liquid (INTZ wins)
With Mad Lions losing their last game to Legacy Esports, INTZ had a shot to force a tiebreaker to make playoffs. However, it was a tall order to beat Team Liquid who have looked exceptional so far.
The game started off in a very uncharacteristic fashion where TL Broxah got caught for trying to force ITZ Shini from the rift scuttler and it blew up on Team Liquid as INTZ grabbed two kills including the first blood. However, Team Liquid manages to grab hold of the game and get a 3k gold lead. After that, Team Liquid started playing it safer with a split push strategy but that got exploited by INTZ over and over again. Hence, INTZ got the lead and never gave it back.
This forced a tiebreaker vs Mad Lions for INTZ to grab the last spot for playoffs and it also forced a tiebreaker for Team Liquid versus the winner of Papara SuperMassive vs Legacy Esports.
Match 4: Legacy Esports vs Papara SuperMassive (Legacy Esports won)
All of a sudden, the winner of this match had the chance to be the first spot in the group. Legacy Esports coming off a win want to build upon this momentum whereas Papara SuperMassive looked to bounce back. The game was reasonably even with a few more kills going to Legacy Esports but Papara SuperMassive grabbing the dragons. The game was even until the fight at the 3rd dragon where Papara SuperMassive gets trapped in the dragon pit by Legacy Esports.
This situation described by the match caster Quickshot as “fish in a barrel” and Papara Supermassive with nowhere to go had to fight with Legacy which resulted in a Legacy Esports team fight win. After that, Legacy Esports kept forcing fights and winning fights. Thus, will all of those won fights, Legacy Esports won the game.
Tiebreakers
Two tiebreakers were taken place, Mad Lions vs INTZ for the fourth place, and Team Liquid vs Legacy Esports for the first place.
Tiebreaker 1: Mad Lions vs INTZ
From favorites to fighting to remain at Worlds is what the story of Mad Lions looked like so far. INTZ started off poorly but the game against Team Liquid gave them a chance to remain at the stage. It was a tense game for both teams because Mad Lions have the expectations of them over their heads while INTZ just wanted to remain at Worlds.
The game started off well for INTZ where they got the lead in the top lane but they had pressure in the mid lane. Even though INTZ started grabbing kills and a gold lead, Mad Lions was grabbing dragons and they had to fight at the 3rd dragon. Before the dragon secured, a fight occurred with INTZ winning out and getting their first dragon to delay the dragon soul. INTZ also forced and obtained the baron buff and look to extend the lead.
Game on the line, Mad Lions start playing smarter and picking their fights which made INTZ anxious, and as they went in for a fight, they got punished by Mad Lions. This became a recurring theme as the game went on and with the confidence that built up for Mad Lions, they win the decisive team fight and take the dragon soul. Thus that wins them the game.
Tiebreaker 2: Team Liquid vs Legacy Esports
Legacy Esports forced a tiebreaker by playing really well today against a Team Liquid team that looks great in play-ins. However, regardless of how good Legacy Esports played, the game was still going to be tough for them to win and it did not look any different. Team Liquid dominated the entire game from start to finish. Except for that one aberrant game from Team Liquid vs INTZ, Team Liquid had looked dominant.
Conclusion:
Team Liquid again looked dominant. They secure first place in the groups, gaining the automatic berth to Group Stages. Mad Lions vs Papara SuperMassive is set to occur tomorrow following Rainbow7 vs LGD. Also, Legacy Esports are sitting comfortably in second place waiting to see who their opponent will be. The playoffs start tomorrow and we shall see which two other teams qualify for the groups.
