If you have been following the professional League of Legends scene for a long time, you would understand the long-standing rivalry between T1 and G2. That’s why Riot Games arranged for these two teams to face off in the opening match of the MSI 2022 Group Stage. A result that few expected occurred when Faker’s T1 had their undefeated streak painfully ended by the exceptionally disciplined G2 Esports with their late-game strategy.
The hype surrounding this match was so immense that when RNG’s Xiaohu conducted an interview, reporters immediately posed numerous questions about T1’s loss. From Xiaohu’s perspective, he believes T1 lost right from the champion selection while G2 Esports executed an outstanding draft.
Question: Did you watch the match between T1 and G2? What do you think was the reason for T1’s defeat?
RNG Xiaohu: For such an important match, it’s obvious that I had to watch it. From what I observed, G2 had an excellent draft and their players executed the strategy with extreme discipline. Meanwhile, T1’s composition lacked the ability to launch a strong attack and break the opponents’ main lanes early on. Perhaps T1 lost to G2 right from the champion selection.
Looking back at T1’s first three picks, we can see that these are typical champions for a control playstyle, including Twisted Fate, Viego, and Kennen. However, these champions do not have the ability to accelerate the game’s tempo through turret dives and early structure takedowns. Therefore, G2 Esports was extremely clever in picking a lane-stabilizing champion like Ornn to bolster their late-game strength.
T1 attempted to rectify this by picking Tristana for quicker turret takedowns, but they lost a crucial team fight at the 24th minute and surrendered Baron to their opponents. As a result, T1’s ability to snowball and control the map was completely thwarted, while G2’s carries had ample time to scale up. By the time Ornn could craft items for all G2 members, T1 had little chance to contend with the LEC representatives.
Perhaps realizing the issue, in their next match against PSG Talon, T1 opted for more aggressive champions like Zoe, Irelia, and Graves, securing a victory. The aforementioned loss serves as a valuable lesson for T1, as to defeat a strong team like G2, they cannot simply play it safe anymore.