HLE clearly shows a critical weakness despite defeating KT
Recently, HLE managed to maintain their second position on the LCK 2025 Rounds 3-5 leaderboard thanks to a comeback victory against KT Rolster. In reality, this was a great match for Zeus, but it is clear that HLE is only winning due to their superior individual skills compared to the opponent. Moreover, throughout the match, their overall gameplay revealed several issues, with one critical weakness identified: HLE’s bot lane is performing extremely poorly.
Specifically, in the 3 games, regardless of champion matchups, Viper – Delight only managed to equalize or lose against their opponents. Even when Viper used a champion he is very comfortable with, Kai’Sa, he could not dominate Deokdam’s Aphelios. With Zeri or Jhin, Viper simply maintained a neutral lane and only gained an advantage when Deokdam had to join team fights and got taken down too many times.
When the bot lane is losing, Zeka was also overwhelmed by Bdd, leaving HLE to rely solely on Zeus. Perhaps even HLE fans felt fortunate that PerfecT had a very disappointing performance, allowing Zeus to completely dominate. In all 3 games, KT’s players made critical mistakes, and in 2 out of 3 games, KT faced defeat.
HLE needs to seriously correct their course before it’s too late
At this moment, theoretically, HLE still has a chance to compete for the title, and the spot for Worlds 2025 is unlikely to slip away from them. However, in reality, after witnessing HLE’s recent matches against T1 and Gen.G, this possibility seems quite low. In fact, if HLE manages to secure a victory against the two teams mentioned above, it will mostly be due to their opponents self-destructing right from the draft phase.
HLE is not performing like a top-tier team, even when facing a team like KT, which is struggling both in performance and morale. If this continues, the LCK Cup and First Stand are the only two titles this star-studded roster might achieve this year, which could be seen as a failure given the significant investment made recently.