Right after Fnatic defeated GAM Esports and became the last team to qualify for the MSI 2024 group stage, the bracket for the most important stage of this year’s MSI was also announced. Accordingly, T1’s bracket is considered a “death bracket” as they share it with Bilibili Gaming, PSG Talon, and G2 Esports. Notably, T1 will clash with their long-time rival – G2. Perhaps Faker and many T1 fans still remember that G2 was the team that made SKT T1 of 2019 “suffer” in both MSI and Worlds. However, that year was also the last brilliant highlight for this highly regarded LEC team.
However, for T1, the reality of such a challenging group could be a basis for fans to believe that their team could rise to the top at MSI 2024. Looking back at T1’s most recent international title, they also found themselves in an extremely tough bracket. In fact, on their journey from the Swiss stage of Worlds 2023 to the championship, T1 faced almost all the strongest teams in the League of Legends scene. Specifically, at last year’s Worlds, T1’s opponents were all formidable names: Team Liquid, Gen.G, Cloud9, Bilibili Gaming, LNG Esports, JD Gaming, and Weibo Gaming.
In this year’s MSI, with this schedule, T1 could very likely clash with the two reigning champions of their competing regions: G2 and BLG. With Gen.G’s bracket being relatively “lighter” for the LCK champions, if T1 manages to get through their two matches in their bracket, they will likely face the “kryptonite” opponent Gen.G. Regardless of the outcome of this confrontation, it could force T1 to face BLG or Gen.G again in the grand finals (if they make it to the finals). However, if these scenarios come to fruition, T1 may have to meet the champions of the three most powerful regions in the League of Legends scene.
And precisely because of such powerful opponents, it inadvertently makes T1’s journey in this MSI fundamentally not much different from Worlds 2023. They still have to enter the “death bracket”, still face the strongest opponents they can encounter, and could once again ascend to the MSI championship similar to how they dominated Worlds 2023 before.