On the fourth day of the MSI 2024 Play-In stage, GAM Esports (GAM) pulled off a spectacular comeback to defeat LOUD (LLL). This victory allows Levi and his teammates to stay in the MSI 2024 and continue to hope for a “miraculous” performance in this tournament. The next team GAM will face is Fnatic, who defeated them just a few days ago.
It is worth noting that in the previous round, LLL had a bright performance against Top Esports, while GAM suffered a comprehensive defeat to Fnatic. Therefore, even Riot’s experts rated LLL higher than the VCS representatives before this match took place. Perhaps because LLL created great hope for the fans and then extinguished it with their defeat, this team is now under immense pressure from fans. Some even expressed their disappointment to the extent of demanding Riot to eliminate the CBLOL region due to their continuous failure.
Fairly speaking, LLL did not have a terrible match against Levi and his teammates. This team truly showed superiority over the VCS representatives in controlling the game in the first match and the first half of the second match. However, their impatience led LLL into GAM’s trap, resulting in crucial team fight losses in the second half of the second game. The consequence was that this defeat created a very poor psychological momentum for LLL, causing them to lose to GAM in the decisive third match.
Of course, demanding Riot to close the CBLOL server is just an expression of the fans’ frustration. Basically, CBLOL still remains a relatively large server in the Americas region. League of Legends tournaments in this area are still organized impressively, attracting many audiences, so Riot has no reason to shut down the CBLOL server.
However, the continuous failures in both MSI and the World Championship over the past few seasons will negatively impact this region. They have consistently finished in the bottom positions in the MSI and World Championship in the 2022, 2023 seasons, and most recently MSI 2024. If this repeats at the upcoming World Championship, it is likely that the CBLOL region will have to compete with the LLA for spots in international tournaments starting in the 2025 season, rather than having its own spot as it does now.
Nevertheless, in reality, the CBLOL league has only gained recognition in recent years. This region still needs more time to develop a professional environment. Therefore, fans might need to show a certain degree of understanding for the teams, especially when CBLOL is still not comparable to VCS or PCS, or even LJL… in terms of historical depth.