It can be said that, apart from the Spring 2022 LCK season extending until the Spring 2023 LCK season, the rest of the time has been incredibly difficult for T1. In fact, the extremely long unbeaten streak when the ZOFGK lineup was officially introduced inadvertently became a massive pressure weighing heavily on the shoulders of T1’s members. Then came various factors, both objective and subjective, such as Faker’s injury and the players’ performance, as well as the strengthening of opponents… leading T1’s star lineup, which is considered to be nearing the perfection of the 2015 – 2016 roster, to only have 1 LCK trophy and 1 World Championship trophy while continuously being defeated by Gen.G.
Notably, during the Spring 2024 LCK season leading up to MSI 2024, it can be viewed as the most challenging time for T1 in recent years. Faker’s injury was still not fully healed, and the players also showed signs of burnout or issues with the changing meta that targeted T1’s weaknesses. However, the most concerning aspect is the DDoS attacks affecting the players’ training. Meanwhile, LCK and Riot left T1 to “bear the burden” for most of the incident duration. It wasn’t until Faker spoke out that the community became aware of the situation.
Importantly, according to a statement from Gumayusi shortly after MSI 2024 ended recently, the DDoS issue still persists and can be seen as T1’s “greatest enemy.” This incident made other teams hesitant to scrim with T1, and the players themselves could not perform at their best to climb the ranks. As demonstrated in the Spring 2024 LCK season, the inability to train effectively led to decreased performance, which in turn increased pressure on the players.
It is worth mentioning that recently, Riot and the LCK organizers released Faker’s HoL at a price that can be described as expensive, further frustrating many T1 fans. One opinion went as far as to say: “They continuously “milk” T1 and Faker, but they cannot resolve the DDoS issue that has existed since last December.”
And it can be said that another difficult summer awaits T1. At this point, no one dares to claim that T1 will be able to replicate last year’s achievements; in fact, some may have already prepared themselves for a season of zero trophies for the powerful ZOFGK squad.