At this point, it might be a bit… outdated to talk about what happened at MSI 2023. However, the first international tournament for the League of Legends (LoL) scene in 2023 still has many points to discuss, especially with teams like T1 and GAM Esports… Recently, AD Carry Gumayusi has shared his thoughts on the team’s journey in the tournament and provided what he believes to be the most reasonable explanation for T1’s disappointing results.
In an interview with reporter Ashley Kang, Gumayusi admitted that he was somewhat overconfident, believing they could defeat Bilibili Gaming (BLG). “It’s just because BLG lost to JD Gaming (JDG), and T1 was just a bit unlucky in not defeating JDG. So at that time, I was very confident, you could say a bit overconfident. Then BLG defeated Gen.G, and I just thought that match would be slightly difficult.”
According to Gumayusi, this excessive confidence caused him to underestimate BLG. In reality, at MSI 2023, when T1 made JDG sweat to win, no one expected Faker and his teammates could collapse so quickly against BLG. In fact, when witnessing the match between T1 and JDG, many viewers believed this would be the matchup for the MSI 2023 finals.
T1’s defeat against BLG was truly a disaster. Gumayusi himself admitted that the team’s performance was very poor, and he felt unsatisfied and even disappointed right from the draft phase. Some behind-the-scenes images revealed that even Keria was devastated after T1 lost so quickly to BLG in the first two games.
Returning to LCK Summer 2023, T1’s performance so far has been average. They have lost to both direct competitors for the title and the 2023 World Championship spots, Gen.G and KT. However, the recent victory against DK may help T1 improve both in morale and in addressing their weaknesses. Once they truly regain their peak form, T1 will still be a top contender for championships in every tournament they participate in.