In the first match of June 19th (Vietnam time) in the LCK Summer 2022, T1 faced off against KT Rolster in a “Media War” showdown. In the last 5 encounters, T1 had completely dominated, leading most viewers to believe this would be an easy victory for Faker and his teammates.
However, the reality of the match was completely opposite. Faker and his teammates faced numerous challenges to defeat KT. Even when T1 gained significant advantages in game 3, their players made countless mistakes and almost lost to KT. If KT’s AD Carry Aiming hadn’t made a mistake in the decisive fight, T1 might have been left “grieving”. Because of this blunder, Aiming also became a subject of ridicule among the League of Legends community.
However, for their part, the T1 players surely cannot be satisfied with their performance in this “Media War” match. KT is a competitor that is significantly weaker than T1. But Faker and his teammates were overconfident in game 1 and only managed to win game 3 “thanks to” their opponent. It’s hard to accept this. More importantly, T1 has made many mistakes that, if their opponents were Gen.G Esports or DWG KIA, the outcome would have been far worse.
Support player Keria from T1 also admitted in a post-match interview that the team played very poorly: “I feel relieved to have won, but in reality, we played very poorly. The whole team did not perform well from the draft phase in games 1 and 3. Moreover, there were situations where we could have anticipated how the opponent would play, but we couldn’t execute it.”
“The team’s goal is obviously to win the championship, starting with LCK Summer 2022. But to be honest, I don’t have much faith that we can win with our current performance. We really need to try harder, correct our mistakes to prove that we can truly compete for the championship.” – Keria stated.
Indeed, T1 is facing many difficulties in executing their gameplay. Their draft is distinctive but ineffective. The players often make mistakes and sometimes rely on a few shining factors or the opponent’s self-mistakes to secure victories. This will be extremely challenging, even threatening T1’s ability to compete for the title against opponents like Gen.G or DK and beyond, representatives from LPL and LEC.