Currently, GAM Esports is heading towards the Swiss round of the 2023 World Championship (Worlds). Their opponent is Gen.G – one of the strongest League of Legends teams in the world today and a top contender for the championship. Of course, GAM has virtually no chance of winning as Gen.G is sure to play more cautiously than Top Esports did in the past. However, facing and competing against the world’s top players will be an invaluable experience for the VCS representative.
However, there is an incident causing the international League of Legends community to be in an uproar, which is related to GAM and occurred about 2 days ago. Specifically, in game 2 against LOUD, top laner Kiaya from GAM used the champion Gnar, and his performances were the key factor that helped GAM dominate the representative from CBLOL. After the match, Kiaya mimicked Gnar’s victory celebration – a move of bouncing and pounding his chest.
However, some CBLOL fans believe that Kiaya’s actions were reminiscent of gorilla movements and associated them with negative connotations. This even escalated into a controversy, with many Brazilian LoL fans demanding Riot to heavily punish Kiaya.
However, this is clearly unreasonable. Even Brazilian League of Legends players have spoken out in support of the Vietnamese top laner, asserting that he was merely repeating Gnar’s actions. Riot themselves also shared this fun celebration image, and there will certainly be no punishment for GAM’s player. Gnar’s chest-pounding action has existed for a long time and is used even when this champion appears in Teamfight Tactics.
Many Vietnamese LoL fans just hope that negative opinions won’t affect Kiaya’s mentality. He has had brilliant performances at Worlds 2023 and will surely be one of the key factors for GAM in the remainder of Worlds 2023.